UPDATE: **'INQUEST - 24 January 2018'** The Complete Mystery of the Death of Kevin Halligen: An Update 15 January 2018

The Complete Mystery of the Death of Kevin Halligen: An Update 15 January 2018

by the Madeleine McCann Research Group



On top of the complete mystery of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, we now have - at least we do at the moment - a second complete mystery: the death of a man at the very centre of the investigations into her disappearance - Kevin Halligen.

It is possible at this stage to be reasonably certain of these very few facts about his death:

1. He died on Monday 8 January, a week ago
   
2. He died either, probably (a) at his home in Guildford, where he had been living with a girlfriend, or ‘partner’, or possibly (b) ‘subsequently’, having been ‘taken ill’
   
3. Surrey Police told the Daily Mail on Saturday (13 January): “We were called to an address in Cobbett Hill Road, Normandy, Guildford, on Monday following a report of a man in his 50s having been taken unwell, who subsequently died. The death is being treated as unexplained and a file will be passed to the coroner's office in due course”.
   
4. Surrey Police are investigating his apparent ‘sudden death’
   
5. Surrey Police describe his death as ‘unexplained’
   
6. His body was reportedly at a morgue on Saturday (13 January)
   
7. A quantity of blood was found at his home.
   

Still unanswered questions

There are still a great many things we do not know about his death. Here are some of them:

A The cause of death
B At what point the police were called
C At what point any doctor, ambulance serviced or hospital was called to him
D At what point his death was certified
E Who certified his death
F Whether or not a post-mortem examination has been performed
G Assuming a post-mortem has been carried out, who carried it out
H When any post-mortem was carried out
I What were the conclusions of the post-mortem
J Whether further enquiries need to be made to establish the cause of death e.g. toxicology reports
K At what point was the Coroner informed of his death
L What action the Coroner has taken so far
M Whether the Coroner has already opened, and adjourned, an inquest (which is common practice)
N Whether the Coroner has called for a second post-mortem to be done
O Who is the Surrey Police ‘Officer-in-Charge’ (O-i-C) or ‘Senior Investigating Officer’ in the case
P Who is the Coroner who will be responsible for conducting any formal inquest
Q Whether anyone else was present when he was ‘taken ill’, or died

Enquiries by MMRG

MMRG has put through calls this morning to Surrey Police, the Coroner’s Office, and the Coroner’s Media Department. Surrey Police have so far confirmed that there is an ongoing investigation but have not confirmed the name of the O-i-C. Voice mails were left with the Coroner and the Coroner’s Media Office, but so far no return calls have been received . We will revert here if we receive any such information


The first report on the Daily Mail online

It is always instructive to look at the very first news report regarding any event. This was clearly the report published around 3pm on Saturday by the MailOnLine website.

The very first thing we notice is their banner headline: “EXCLUSIVE: Mystery surrounds the death of private detective Kevin Halligen, 56”. This tells us two things (1) that this story was supplied exclusively to the Daily Mail, and (b) that his death is a ‘mystery’. Which it still is.

Whilst some newspapers are relatively casual about publishing stories from ‘sources’, the Daily Mail is not in that category. Moreover, the facts in their article are mildly sensational and quite graphic. They would hardly run this story without impeccable sources.


Sources for the Daily Mail article

So we look to see what sources the Daily Mail is citing to back its report. There are either two or three:

First source: One former colleague told MailOnline: 'The house was covered in blood but apparently that was from Kevin falling down so much. His body is now in the morgue. The police are looking into it.'

Second source: Defence consultant Tim Craig-Harvey, a former associate of Halligen, wrote online: 'The lies and alcohol finally caught up with him.'

Third source: Another source told MailOnline: 'He died at his girlfriend's place near Guildford, a miserable pathetic death caused by alcohol.'

NOTE: It is possible, the way the report is written, that the third source could also be the first source.

The evidence provided by these sources amounts to this;

A He died at his girlfriend’s house
B The house was ‘covered in blood’ and
C (from two sources) His death was ‘caused by alcohol’.

Now we take a look at these sources.

One of them is named: Tim Craig-Harvey. What do we know about him? He first came to the notice of people interested in the Madeleine McCann case when he appeared in a very strange film transmitted on Channel 5 in early 2014: ‘The McCanns and the Con-Man’. We also know that he was hired by the McCanns and Brian Kennedy as part of the Oakley International/Halligen private investigation which ran from April to August 2008.

This peculiar film tried to persuade viewers of the following:

1 That the private detectives employed by the McCanns and Brian Kennedy - Kevin Halligen, Henri Exton and Tim Craig-Harvey - were engaged on a genuine search for Madeleine

2 That a hunt for a market-trader on the Algarve, said by Halligen & Exton to be a genuine suspect, and filmed by Exton and an accomplice, was a genuine hunt for a true suspect - and not merely a piece of footage used for propaganda purposes

3 That Kevin Halligen was a serial con-man and fraudster who had successfully ‘deceived’ not only the McCanns, but also Brian Kennedy and their entire legal team and PR advisers, into giving him £½ million, allegedly to help find Madeleine, and

4 That Henri Exton’s work with the Smith family in Ireland, including his puzzling two e-fits of two different-looking men, was a ‘breakthrough’ which had opened up the Met Police’s Operation Grange investigation into Madeleine’s disappearance and provided a new and valuable line of enquiry.

In short, this Channel 5 ‘documentary’ was a fraudulent piece of propaganda. Moreover, as is clear from research threads on the CMOMM forum, all three had at one time been heavily involved with either the British government’s state security services, or the Ministry of Defence, or both. In Exton’s case, it has been publicly admitted that he was the former Head of Covert Intelligence at MI5.

That means we have to take extreme caution in accepting anything they say about the death of Kevin Halligen.

Why did these ‘sources’ speak to the Daily Mail?

It is possible that someone within Surrey police contacted the Daily Mail first, alerting them to the suspicious circumstances about Halligen’s death - and that then the Daily Mail began contacting Halligen’s former colleagues and friends. We do not know.

It is possible that Halligen’s friends felt they wanted, for whatever reason, to tell the Daily Mail that their friend had died and how he had died. It is certainly possible that they are not telling the whole truth about how he died. They do not appear to have said much except that one of them mentioned a lot of blood in the house, which has led to the rather lurid ‘blood-soaked body’ and ‘brutal murder’ headlines in some of the tabloids.

It has to be said that there was no especial reason why the police or the Coroner or anyone else should make any announcement about Halligen’s death. Unexpected deaths happen all the time, the police pursue their enquiries, so does the Coroner.

A conclusion is reached about the cause of death, and hardly anyone outside the family and friends know about it.

In this case, three matters make his death of interest. First, Halligen was a prime and highly controversial private Madeleine McCann investigator. Second, the presence of blood. His girlfriend’s house was ‘covered in blood’, and the Daily Mail made reference to his ‘blood-soaked body’. And third, his previous history of being involved in the production of lithium batteries, Ministry of Defence contracts, and his many security services connections.

Let us not forget, either, that Halligen was reputedly paid £2 million by corrupt Dutch company Trafigura, a company that for a long time was represented by top libel firm Carter-Ruck. Is it a coincidence that the corrupt con-man and serial fraudster Kevin Halligen was employed by both Trafigura and the McCanns, both high-profile clients of the wealthy libel firm, Carter-Ruck?


How is the blood explained?

These are the explanations we have heard so far about apparently large quantities of blood found in some kind of association with Halligen’s body:

Tim Craig-Harvey: “The lies and alcohol finally caught up with him”.

A Daily Mail source: “He died at his girlfriend's place…a miserable pathetic death caused by alcohol”.

A ‘former colleague’: “The house was covered in blood but apparently that was from Kevin falling down so much”.

An article by-lined by Tracey Kandohla said that “…a source who knew the Dublin-born debt-ridden private eye say he was ‘a boozer’ and ‘drink was inevitably his downfall’.

The Sunday Independent yesterday quoted Adrain Gatton as follows: "Adrian Gatton, a TV director and investigative journalist, who made a documentary with Halligen in 2014 The McCanns and the Conman and who knew Halligen well, confirmed that he died last Monday, having sunk into alcohol addiction. He said: "Although his death is certainly not foul play, as has been suggested…My understanding is that he was found dead on Monday night. There was blood around the house, probably caused by previous falls when he was either drunk or blacking out. Halligen was increasingly shambolic and these blood stains hadn't been cleared up. His house was full of empty drink bottles. A lot of people wished him ill. But he was also unique…his death is almost certainly related to alcoholism. I knew chapter and verse about his life and career ".

Gatton made a thoroughly misleading film for Channel 5 about Halligen and Exton. Can we trust his words? - we doubt it. So far we have not heard from Halligen’s girlfriend, nor from members of his family. We have only heard so far from people in his corrupt, security-service-related coterie. And without a post-mortem, members of this coterie are being allowed by the media to state, unchallenged, basically something like this this: “He was so drunk most of the time that he kept falling over, drunk, losing blood every time, which he and his girlfriend never bothered to clean up. Probably this was another time when he drunk so much that he fell and lost so much blood that he died”.

Well, MMRG isn’t buying this. Not yet, anyway.

Martin Brunt

Finally, it is of interest to note than no sooner had the Daily Mail run with its story about Kevin Halligen’s death, the first news agency to follow up the story was the SKY News, who quoted Martin Brunt’s report.

Here is an extract from the current Wikiepdia article on Brunt:


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"Later, Brunt was first to break news of the death of the Queen Mother in 2002 and the murder of television presenter Jill Dando in 1999.[citation needed]

In 2005, he was first to report that the 7 July explosions in London were the work of terrorists.[citation needed]

Brunt reported from South Africa on the murder inquiry into "Adam", an unknown boy whose torso was found in the River Thames in 2001.

He has a reputation for gaining insider information: Hugo Rifkind reported in The Times diary of 22 December 2006:

"High praise for the Sky News crime correspondent Martin Brunt. When a hack from (another) newspaper phoned Suffolk Police press office with a query on the serial killer case, he was told: 'Call Martin Brunt. He knows everything before we do.' A little concerning."

Brunt was first to report the arrest of Amy Winehouse, and the resignation of Sir Ian Blair as Metropolitan Police commissioner, and was the first to interview Robert Murat, then suspected of involvement in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann. His contacts also led to Sky News being first to report that the 7 July events in London were the work of terrorists and allowed Sky News to break the news of the death of the Queen Mother. In 2010, Brunt reported live from Rothbury during the police hunt for gunman Raoul Moat.[1]

In October 2014, Brunt was the journalist involved in revealing the identity of Brenda Leyland, who had posted comments concerning the McCann investigation on social media. Following the revelation and a report to Leicestershire Police, Brunt and a camera crew confronted Leyland at her home.[3] Following the confrontation Leyland was later found dead in a hotel, leading to calls on social media for Brunt to be sacked.[4]

Brunt briefly became an internet sensation in August 2016, for a Sky news report at St James Church in Weybridge, following the murder of a French priest, Jacques Hamel, by an ISIS terrorist. Brunt was widely mocked for walking out of the church saying "If I was a terrorist, I could’ve killed them all". This led to multiple news reports and social media comments ridiculing the reporter [5]"

MMRG have asked the Surrey Coroner's Office these questions:

(1) When was Kevin Halligen's death reported to the Coroner?

(2) Has there, or will there be, the opening of an inquest into Halligen's death? and

(3) Has a port-mortem taken place and if so, has the cause of death been established?

MMRG have now been told that a press release on these issues is being prepared by the Coroner and will be available tomorrow.

Excellent work, Miss Havern.

FURTHER UPDATE FROM MMRG

MMRG sent the email below to the Surrey Coroner’s Office last night:


Dear Coroner/staff

We confirm our enquiry at around 9.30am this morning when we made enquiries following the reported death of Kevin Richard Halligen, in most of the British mainstream press, over the past three days. It was also the subject of international coverage as he had been a prominent albeit controversial private detective hired by the McCanns to look for Madeleine  

The content of the press reports suggested the following:

1 Mr Halligen died on Monday 8 January

2 According to a Surrey Police statement he was 'taken ill' on Monday and 'subsequently died'

3 Surrey Police confirmed that the death was being treated as 'unexplained' and stated that the Coroner would receive a file 'in due course'

4  Most press reports referred to blood being associated with Mr Halligen's death. One report claimed his body was soaked in blood. Another headline suggested he had been 'brutally murdered'

5 Several friends of Mr Halligen have been speaking to the media and have given the impression that he fell down drunk, suffered serious injuries, and died. Two other reports from these friends added the detail that there was blood 'all over the house' which had never been cleaned up because he fell and lost blood on so many previous occasions.

Our questions, which we think are all matters of public record, and we see no reason why straightforward answers cannot be given on the public record, are:

1 When was the Coroner first informed of his death?

2 When was the post mortem held?

3 Did the post mortem establish the cause of death or are further enquiries needed?

4 Has the Coroner opened an inquest into his death (if so when was that) or, if not, is there a date set yet for when any inquest will be opened?

We left messages this morning on both 01483 637300 and 01483 637628 (Sarah Church) but got no replies.

We 'phoned this afternoon and a very helpful gentleman colleague 'phoned me back stating (I think) that a press release had been or was being prepared and that we should ring Sarah Church, your P.A., in the morning.

We were also given your e-mail address and if it is possible for you to let us have a copy of the press release as soon as it is issued, we should be most grateful.

As your staff were unable to locate any reported death in Surrey this month for the name 'Halligen' or 'Halligan' we did wonder whether there might be difficulties concerning his name, as we are aware from extensive published research of ours that he has used many aliases.

These, to our knowledge, include at least the following:

Kevin Richard Halligen
Kevin Halligan (different spelling of his surname)
Richard Halligen and
Richard Hall.

There may well have been several others.    

Many thanks.


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We have today been advised that the Coroner’s Officer, Dawn Worsnip, is the person who will be in a position to answer these questions. She was unavailable to talk to this morning but we have left a message asking for a call-back.




Your email has been received by the Surrey Coroners Office and will be dealt with accordingly.

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Maybe he Kellied himself?

As in Dr David Kelly - a man who, despite already being dead, managed to move from a prostrate position to go and sit leaning against a tree?

I am sure he made a lot of enemies in his life, but reading between the lines it sounds like alcoholic hemorrhage to me . . . but that is obviously what they want you to think.

As for martin brunt, there is a man who is obviously the mouthpiece of Security Services. He doesn't do a days work uncovering stories, just re-ports what his masters tell him to. He always has the breaking "news" right from his home office . . . or should that be Home Office.

It's a mystery that the Coroner's staff couldn't find any record of Kevin Halligen's death being reported.

No press release by the Coroner's PA, Sarah Church, yet either that I've seen.

Probably a perfectly good reason for both though.

It would appear to me that the TV director and investigative journalist Adrian Gatton (the bloke who produced The Conman documentary) was instrumental in the reportage of Halligen's death hitting the headlines linking directly to the McCanns.  Whether or not he was aided and abetted by someone like Clarence Mitchell remains to be seen.

I seriously doubt Halligen's death would have been reported by main stream media if it wasn't for the McCann connection.

Had a quick run through Surrey Police news but can't find any reference to Halligen, his girlfriend or the Surrey mansion where he is said to have died.  It's a toss-up whether the mansion belonged to Halligen or his girlfriend - media reports differ.

Halligen's company Red Defence International was registered to an address on Cobbett Hill Road, as reported in the articles as to where he was when an ambulance was called.

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It could very well be described as a mansion and apparently was turned into 4 flats at some point, so he may have lived in one whilst other people occupied the remaining flats.

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It seems to me that Red Defence and Oakley International were companies in name only - Halligen, a one man band who sub-contracted as and when required.

The reported location of Halligen's death was Henley Park, Cobbett Hill Road, Normandy, Surrey - whether that's his property or his girlfriend's is yet to be determined.  Henley Park is clearly property of opulent proportions judging by the entrance and driveway..

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There is also an aerial view here..

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Third time lucky then it would seem.

Although, still not seen the press release from Surrey Coroner's office after they could find no record of his death.

The thick plottens 

We had one particularly bad experience with a man named Kevin Halligen (or Richard, as we knew him). Halligen was the CEO of a private-investigation firm called Oakley International which was hired by Madeleine’s Fund for six months from the end of March 2008. Oakley’s proposal and overall strategy were streets ahead of all the others we’d considered and the company came highly recommended. As the sums of money involved were pretty hefty, we agreed that our contract with them would be split into three phases with a break clause at the end of each phase. This gave us an opportunity to terminate the contract at any of these points if we wished to do so without incurring financial penalties. An independent consultant was also employed by the fund to liaise with Oakley and oversee the work they were doing.

The first and second phases of the contract ran fairly smoothly. Oakley had put in place systems to gather, collate, prioritize and follow up the information coming in as a result of appeals Gerry and I made around the first anniversary of Madeleine’s abduction. There is little doubt that at that stage progress was being made.

During the third phase, however, we began to have concerns. Feedback appeared to be less forthcoming and contact with certain members of the Oakley team dropped off. At first we couldn’t be sure whether this was a manifestation of the inevitable waning motivation I’ve mentioned or of a more troubling problem. Rumours about Halligen prompted us to make inquiries before we decided whether or not we should extend our contract with Oakley. To cut a long story short, we chose not to do so. The termination of the contract, in September 2008, was quite acrimonious, and unfortunately, that was not the end of it.

Several months later, one of the investigators subcontracted by Oakley contacted us to demand payment for his services. We had already settled Oakley’s bill for this work months before, but apparently the company had not paid him. He was not the only one. Over time several more unpaid subcontractors came to light. We were upset that, although a lot of hard work had been done on Madeleine’s behalf, it seemed money provided by her fund might not ever have reached the people who had earned it.

In November 2009 we heard that Halligen had been arrested on suspicion of fraud after a discrepancy in a hotel bill. He is currently on remand in Belmarsh prison, fighting extradition to the USA in connection with money-laundering and wire-fraud charges, all of which he denies.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[Excerpt for research and study only]

Bizarre ploys of ‘detective’ Kevin Halligen who conned the McCanns REVEALED

THE extraordinary tactics of the bogus private investigator hired by the parents of Madeleine McCann to find their daughter can now be revealed. Kevin Halligen dreamt up bizarre undercover methods in his bid to catch the little girl’s kidnapper.

By James Murray, EXCLUSIVE 
PUBLISHED:  00:01, Sun, Jan 21, 2018


The Walter Mitty character, who [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.], was a heavy drinker, a liar and fantasist who persuaded Kate and Gerry McCann to part with £300,000 from the Madeleine Fund after visiting them at their home in Rothley, Leicestershire. 

Part of the reason the McCanns were persuaded by him was because he took along Henry Exton, who had run brilliant surveillance operations at M15 and has an impeccable reputation. 

But Mr Exton was also duped by Halligen. 

Madeleine vanished on May 3, 2007, and Halligen offered the desperate couple the services of his firm, Oakley International, a year later. 


The deal was for the so-called Operation Omega where Mr Exton ran an undercover team in Praia da Luz on the Algarve. 

It was where the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner had seen a man carrying a child from the couple’s apartment. 

Halligen went on to recruit a couple with a young daughter to walk around Luz to try to flush out the kidnapper. 

Richard Parton, a security expert in Washington, was appalled by the ploy. 


Speaking in a documentary, The Conman And The McCanns, he said: “He got a couple to go on holiday with a child who looks a lot like Madeleine. 

“Apparently, she was to have been used as bait.” 

An appeal for witnesses produced a London City worker who confirmed a description from Jane Tanner. 

He helped produce an image of the suspect. 
But one man was trailed for weeks, despite the witness saying he didn’t look like the suspect.


Halligen was also supposed to be using top Washington security contacts to secure military satellite images showing who had entered the apartment. 

No such images exist and Halligen produced Google Earth photographs. 

An unimpressed Mr Exton was by now £100,000 out of pocket, with Halligen’s cheques bouncing. 

In 2012 Halligen was extradited from Britain to America where he admitted conning millions of pounds from a company whose executives had been kidnapped in Africa and was jailed.



Mr Exton says he regrets working with Halligen but defends the work done in Portugal.  

“The distraction of Halligen’s behaviour undermined the very good work that was done,” he said. 

One key part of that work was getting e-fit images of a man seen carrying Madeleine towards the beach, pictures Scotland Yard later publicised. 

Maker of the documentary, Adrian Gatton, said he saw Halligen in 2017, “somewhat the worse for wear”. 



He wrote on Twitter: “He was recovering from a car crash, an accident he claimed was an attempted ‘hit’. 

“In 2016 he told me he had been poisoned.” 

Surrey Police are preparing a report for the coroner on Dublin-born Halligen’s death on January 8 at the home of his girlfriend near Guildford. 

They say his death is “unexplained”.



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What an extraordinary report for a longstanding seasoned journalist. The usual base information repeated ad-infinitum, individualistically embellished and transformed into pro-McCann propaganda.

This James Murray character is on a par with Tracey Kandohla and her ilk, never misses an opportunity to churn out yet another nonsense story to boost the McCann image in the public eye.

Of all the misdemeanors Halligen had under his belt, why on earth are the McCanns getting all the attention? Unless it can be proven at some stage in the future, which I seriously doubt, that Halligen's demise was directly connected to the McCanns, this is just another non-event.

As far as I'm aware, there is still no official confirmation of his death. After the initial report during the week, nothing further has been reported on the subject. Halligen's death has not been reported on the Surrey police website, nor the Surrey coroner for recent and pending hearings.

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Get'emGonçalo wrote:Bizarre ploys of ‘detective’ Kevin Halligen who conned the McCanns REVEALED

THE extraordinary tactics of the bogus private investigator hired by the parents of Madeleine McCann to find their daughter can now be revealed. Kevin Halligen dreamt up bizarre undercover methods in his bid to catch the little girl’s kidnapper.

By James Murray, EXCLUSIVE 
PUBLISHED:  00:01, Sun, Jan 21, 2018


The Walter Mitty character, who [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.], was a heavy drinker, a liar and fantasist who persuaded Kate and Gerry McCann to part with £300,000 from the Madeleine Fund after visiting them at their home in Rothley, Leicestershire. 

Part of the reason the McCanns were persuaded by him was because he took along Henry Exton, who had run brilliant surveillance operations at M15 and has an impeccable reputation. 

But Mr Exton was also duped by Halligen. 

Madeleine vanished on May 3, 2007, and Halligen offered the desperate couple the services of his firm, Oakley International, a year later. 


The deal was for the so-called Operation Omega where Mr Exton ran an undercover team in Praia da Luz on the Algarve. 

It was where the McCanns’ friend Jane Tanner had seen a man carrying a child from the couple’s apartment. 

Halligen went on to recruit a couple with a young daughter to walk around Luz to try to flush out the kidnapper. 

Richard Parton, a security expert in Washington, was appalled by the ploy. 


Speaking in a documentary, The Conman And The McCanns, he said: “He got a couple to go on holiday with a child who looks a lot like Madeleine. 

“Apparently, she was to have been used as bait.” 

An appeal for witnesses produced a London City worker who confirmed a description from Jane Tanner. 

He helped produce an image of the suspect. 
But one man was trailed for weeks, despite the witness saying he didn’t look like the suspect.


Halligen was also supposed to be using top Washington security contacts to secure military satellite images showing who had entered the apartment. 

No such images exist and Halligen produced Google Earth photographs. 

An unimpressed Mr Exton was by now £100,000 out of pocket, with Halligen’s cheques bouncing. 

In 2012 Halligen was extradited from Britain to America where he admitted conning millions of pounds from a company whose executives had been kidnapped in Africa and was jailed.



Mr Exton says he regrets working with Halligen but defends the work done in Portugal.  

“The distraction of Halligen’s behaviour undermined the very good work that was done,” he said. 

One key part of that work was getting e-fit images of a man seen carrying Madeleine towards the beach, pictures Scotland Yard later publicised. 

Maker of the documentary, Adrian Gatton, said he saw Halligen in 2017, “somewhat the worse for wear”. 



He wrote on Twitter: “He was recovering from a car crash, an accident he claimed was an attempted ‘hit’. 

“In 2016 he told me he had been poisoned.” 

Surrey Police are preparing a report for the coroner on Dublin-born Halligen’s death on January 8 at the home of his girlfriend near Guildford. 

They say his death is “unexplained”.



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From the above article, "One key part of the work was getting efit images of a man seen carrying Madeleine towards the beach."  Carrying Madeleine, really?

Update by MMRG, 22 January 2008


Early on Tuesday 16 January, the Surrey Coroner’s Office replied to MMRG with the following message:

Your email has been received by the Surrey Coroners Office and will be dealt with accordingly.

Email- [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
01483 637300 (Tel)
01483 634814 (Fax)
Office opening times- 8am to 4pm

--------

About one hour later, the following reply was received:

On Tuesday, 16 January 2018, 12:02,
Coroners Officers (Surrey) wrote:


Dear MMRG

Thank you for your email. It has been forwarded to the appropriate officer and they will respond in due course.

Regards,

Louise Cane
Coroner's Senior Administrator
Coroner's Unit
Investigation Support & Criminal Justice Department
(01483) 637300
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No reply has been received yet, and further voice mail messages left have not so far been returned.

Accordingly, MMRG today (22 January) sent the following message:


Dear Coroner / Coroner's Officer Dawn Worsnip,

We write to renew our questions about the reported of death of Kevin Richard Halligen at an address in Surrey, which the public have been told occurred on 8 January.

To recap, when we first contacted your office on Monday 15 January we were told by one of your male colleagues that his death had NOT been reported to the Coroner, either under the name ‘Halligen’ or ‘Halligan’, both of which surnames had been used by him.

We were later told that the matter of Halligen’s death had been widely ‘discussed in the office’ and that a press release had either been prepared or was being prepared by the Coroner’s Media Officer, Sarah Church. We were told to call again, and later to send an e-mail, both of which we did, but to this day no-one has either sent us the press release nor told us whether there ever was one.

We last sent an email to yourselves on 16 January (see below) but to date we have had no further reply.

The specific questions we asked were: 

1 When was the Coroner first informed of his death?
2 When was the post mortem held?
3 Did the post mortem establish the cause of death or are further enquiries needed?
4 Has the Coroner opened an inquest into his death (if so when was that) or, if not, is there a date set yet for when any inquest will be opened?

There have been further reports in the mainstream press about Mr Halligen’s death this week.

In the Sunday Express yesterday, reporter James Murray wrote: “Kevin Halligen, the Walter Mitty character, who was found dead earlier this month, was a heavy drinker, a liar and fantasist… Surrey Police are preparing a report for the coroner on Dublin-born Halligen’s death on January 8 at the home of his girlfriend near Guildford. They say his death is ‘unexplained’.”

The claim by the Sunday Express that Halligen was ‘found dead’ specifically contradicts the only report available so far from Surrey Police, which said specifically said that he ‘was taken ill’ and ‘subsequently died’. Moreover, all the press reports said that when he was ‘taken ill’, the police, rather than the Ambulance Service, were called.

As you will recall from my previous enquiries, press reports described Kevin Halligen as having been found ‘blood-soaked'. One report said he had been ‘brutally murdered’, while two friends of his have said there were trails of dried blood all over the property, which they ascribed to him having fallen over so many times - and that neither he nor anyone else had cleaned up all the blood. 

During the past few days, a TV journalist and producer, Adrian Gatton, who made a 2014 Channel 5 documentary about Kevin Halligen, and says he is a friend of Halligen's, told newspapers that he: “…confirmed to the Press Association that [Halligen] died last Monday, having sunk into alcohol addiction”, adding “Although his death is certainly not foul play, as has been suggested, there are certainly a lot of people who wished him ill…”

This report of Mr Gatton’s comments suggests that Halligen did not die from any foul play but died from alcohol poisoning or an alcohol-related condition. In that case, it is hard to understand why, if there has been a post-mortem that has decided he died from alcoholism, Surrey Police continue to describe Halligen’s death as 'unexplained'. 

The fact that Surrey Police state that they are ‘preparing a report for the Coroner’ suggests that you must already have been informed about the death. It seems reasonable, therefore, to enquire whether there has been a post-mortem, and when (if at all) you were informed of the death and, if so, what action, if any, you have subsequently taken.

It may be that for some reason you are unable to supply us with any information at all about Kevin Halligen’s death. If that is the case, could you be good enough please to supply a short reply confirming that. We should be grateful.

Yours sincerely
MMRG

Further update by MMRG, 8am, 23 January 2018

REPLY BY H.M. CORONER, SURREY, RE THE DEATH OF KEVIN HALLIGEN

MMRG has received the following update from HM Coroner:
 
An inquest will be opened on 24th January at 10am, and you are welcome to attend.

 Kind regards

Helen Jones

Coroner's Support Officer

Coroner's Unit

Investigation Support & Criminal Justice Department

 HM Coroner's Court, Station Approach, WOKING, Surrey, GU22 7AP 

Tel: 01483 637300   Fax: 01483 637300

Email: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]


Note: This is just the formal opening of the Inquest. This is a formality and normally only takes a few minutes. It would appear that the police are still making enquiries. We would expect the full inquest to take place many weeks or even months from now. A post mortem must have been held and there may be some kind of report on that made at the formal opening of the inquest. The Coroner has the right to request a second post mortem or other expert medical opinion and again there may be an announcement about this on 24 January (tomorrow).

MMRG


PS. No member of MMRG is able to attend the opening of the inquest of Halligen’s death tomorrow. If there is a CMOMM member or guest in the Surrey/London area who is able to do so and send a report of proceedings, that would be very helpful - MMRG

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[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] Maddie investigator Kevin Halligen’s inquest at Woking Coroner’s Court. Given name: Richard Powell (his latest alias, as he told me). Occupation: Intelligence and Security Officer (sic). Cause of death: acute subdural haemorrhage. [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

'Richard Powell (his latest alias, as he told me)'


So Brunty's been talking to Halligen (shortly?) before he died?

I wonder why?



ETA

Sorry, misread the tweet. This is Adrian Gatton talking, not Martin Brunt, who's just been copied in.

Inquest adjourned until 2nd July 2018. Why does a 'straightforward' case take so long?

The Spectre at the Feast...

I think that the passing of latest alias/name was to Gatton, not Brunt.
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Posted up-page by Get'emGonçalo..

Further update by MMRG, 8am, 23 January 2018

REPLY BY H.M. CORONER, SURREY, RE THE DEATH OF KEVIN HALLIGEN

MMRG has received the following update from HM Coroner:

An inquest will be opened on 24th January at 10am, and you are welcome to attend.

Kind regards

Helen Jones

Coroner's Support Officer

Coroner's Unit

Investigation Support & Criminal Justice Department

HM Coroner's Court, Station Approach, WOKING, Surrey, GU22 7AP

Tel: 01483 637300   Fax: 01483 637300

Email: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I'm more than interested to learn exactly what Adrian Gatton's game is here.

"I'm more than interested to learn exactly what Adrian Gatton's game is here."

Likewise.

An acute subdural haemorrhage is "usually the result of a serious head injury" and if CPR were administered, he was obviously found with signs of life.

So who called the emergency services ??