THE TRUE BACKGROUND TO THE SOLHEIM CONNECTION WHICH THE JURY NEVER HEARD


BLACK MAGIC PETER AND ME

By Simon Greensted

Murdered councillor Peter Solheim was a member of a chain of Cornish covens and was known by cult members as "Thor's Hammer," the Falmouth Packet can reveal today.

In an exclusive interview, Falmouth "High Priest" Peter Petrauske said Mr Solheim - whose body was pulled from the sea off the Lizard on June 18 - believed he could cast spells and was kicked out of a string of occult groups because of his extreme opinions.

Mr Petrauske, who lives on The Beacon and is known in town as "Pete the German," said:

 "Members of my group thought he was off his head. He always had a great big sword and helmet - he caused a lot of trouble."

Mr Petrauske talked to the Packet after national newspapers last week published stories linking Mr Solheim with black magic and Satanism.

As high priest of a St Ives-based coven Mr Petrauske is known as Lord Mukrah. He said that because of the trouble Mr Solheim - a Budock parish councillor - caused, he ended up having to kick him out of his group too. Mr Petrauske said the 56-year-old acted as though he knew everything, told people he could cast spells and despite having a partner had openly flirted with many other occultists.

Mr Petrauske said he met the murder victim for the first time several years ago (Ed circa 2000) when Mr Solheim was a member of a coven in Padstow. "Peter was there then but he caused a lot of havoc and they told him to leave," he said.

The pictures in this week's Packet of druid rituals were taken at a coven in St Merryn, which Mr Solheim also attended.

Mr Solheim asked to join Mr Petrauske's Wiccan coven, another order within the occult world, but soon started to upset people. When a woman who had rejected his advances at a former coven joined the Wiccan group, Mr Solheim had demanded to know why he had not been consulted about her membership, claimed Mr Petrauske.

"That caused trouble and he tried to do all sorts of things. He used to say you mustn't do this or that, but his knowledge was crap, he didn't know anything in my opinion," he said.

Mr Petrauske eventually asked him to leave. "Personally, my theory is all this devil worship had nothing to do with it because he did not have enough knowledge. He probably just upset somebody," said Mr Petraske.

 "Any suggestion that Peter was murdered as a sacrifice is a load of crap and so's all this crap about Satanism and black magic."

He said there were a number of covens in Cornwall but he had not heard of any involved in devil worship, though he accepted this did not mean they did not exist.

Mr Solheim made gifts of swords to fellow members of the occult groups. .. he joined and fashioned the Wiccan Pentacle [Ed: shown in the photo above right]  as a special gift to Mr Petrauske. He said despite their arguments the pair always remained friends and he had last seen Mr Solheim three weeks prior to his death.

Yesterday Detective Inspector Neil Best told the Packet:

 "This [the occult] is a subject we are trying to bring focus away from. We are looking at what happened to Mr Solheim and his history is important but it is not a main focus for us."

Police are still describing the injuries on Mr Solheim's body as "unexplained" but Mr Petrauske can not think of any occult ritual which would cause "unexplained injuries."

After last Wednesday and Thursday's questioning of more than 200 people at Mylor Harbour police came across a new lead with witnesses seeing Mr Solheim board his boat, the Izzwizz, with another man and motor-off on the Wednesday evening, June 16.

Det Insp Best said: "That really is a significant step forward, whether that man is 'Charlie', he might have been called something else, we urgently need to talk to him."

He is appealing to anyone else who may have seen Mr Solheim at Mylor Harbour or on the Carrick Roads, or boarding a bigger boat.

Asked about Mr Solheim's links wrth black magic, John Bastin, chairman of Budock parish, who grew up in the village with him, said: "I was certainly taken aback - I didn't know anything about it but there were signs on reflection."

He said he now remembers Mr Solheim blaming the flooding of his mother's house in Budock on the spirits of the river being angry.

"It was nothing as heavy as it appears to be now. As far as the dark side of things, we did not have a clue."

The investigation team has been stepped up to 30 officers and anyone with information about the murder is asked to telephone Falmouth police station on 1111822452722277222444.

First published on Thursday 08 July 2004 in the Falmouth Packet.



XISTS AND THE
RITUAL ABUSE AXIS: THE GENESIS OF SATANIC RITUAL CHILD ABUSE AND HOW THEY'VE BEEN AFTER NAILING PAGANISM FOR YEARS

In the beginning they called it Satanic Ritual Child Abuse. (SRA) They told you Satanists were  raping and killing children in  appalling rituals of human sacrifice. The public gasped in horror  but right at the start we said it was all sectarian lies - a disguised attack on the new religion of paganism by it's historical foe.

Then, it became clear that the victim imposters who gave first hand evidence of these claims were all christian fundamentalist agitators telling sectarian lies. We had been right. The public gasped in horror again.

Undetered the  witch-finders in social work hunted down little children from dysfunctional families so they could brainwash them into fantasising allegations against their parents and confirm the SRA claims, but lo - Rochdale, Orkney Manchester, Ayrshire, Epping and dozens of other false cases of SRA were the result. We said we told you so. The public gasped in horror at being duped a  third time.

We said that SRA troublemakers would not stop unless they were prosecuted or sued.  The state would not prosecute them and though BIG settlements were made by local authorities, guilty social workers and psychotherapists were let off the hook by their professional indemnity insurance and got away scot-free to continue doing their worst.


These terrible errors and injustices lead to a public inquiry and the term Satanic Ritual Abuse was utterly discredited. Believers in it had meanwhile built an industry which paid well on the back of the lies.  They persisted. They lied again. They said they had never used the term SATANIC. They changed tack and widened their scope by dropping the Satanic prefix and inventing  Ritual Abuse - this, they said, was any sexual abuse in which the perpetrators used religious trappings to scare their victims into compliance.  The public dutifully let out another gasp of outrage.

 To those within the inner-circles of the child scare industry, ( who never, ever,under any circumstances admit to having been wrong about anything at all ever),   it was still SATANIC Ritual Abuse, but for Joe Public  out there on the street it also could mean any outrageous form of abuse to adults or children which involved bizarre elements. Gullibly trusting as ever the public gasped in horror and suckered in yet again. .

We said it was a lie to enable the largely Christian inspired  child scare industry to continue to  persecute the growing religion of paganism.   To prove this  we  did historic research into the incidence of Priestly Abuse which uncovered a cesspit of  40,000 child abusers in the RC church alone.  Wasn't this the real source of 'ritual abuse'?  The public gasped in horror but the child scare industry brushed aside  the reality of  priestly abuse because, as we had said,  it was only a front for pursuing  their hatred for  pagans.

To achieve their ends they set up a circus of psychotherapists and a new demonology termed  Recovered Memories. They preyed upon dysfunctional women with a history of mental illness and hypnotised them into confabulating shocking  memories of SATANIC abuse which 'confirmed' the  age-old stereotypes and blood-libels used by the church to  stamp  out Paganism.  The public let out yet another cry of astonishment and called for something to be done.

Recovered memories created THOUSANDS of false cases where adult women who should have been getting proper medical help ended up accusing bemused respectable loving parents of being Satanists or Witches who had 'ritually' abused them  when they were children.  Recovered Memory therapy became a growth industry in the U.S. for years until several of these 'patients' woke up to what was happening and sued their 'therapists' for enormous sums in damages - in one case over a million dollars. The public gasped in disbelief and the normally strident U.S therapists fell uncharacteristically quiet.

We said that the front-line in the evangelical war against Paganism had now been transferred to the U.K. where 'therapists' could behave astonishingly irresponsibly and get away with it as the Carol Myers/Felstead case amply proves. The shocked public let out yet another gasp of outrage.

Undaunted the child scare industry and it's associated therapeutic bandwagon moved on to a synthesis of semi-recovered memory therapy interlaced with free-style counselling which capitalised on the growing phenomenon of claims of 'Historic' sex abuse where victims who had remained silent about their abuse for forty years  or more, (often until after the person they were accusing had died and could not counter their accusations), discovered that they could get 25,000.00 or so from the Criminal Injuries Board as a matter of course.

 Following the recent hysteria surrounding Jimmy Saville the NSPCC proudly claimed that cases of historic abuse reported to them had increased by over 20% .  People now saying they had been abused by Saville numbered nearly 500.

Is it a surprise that child-scare industry scaremongering over risks to children has increased inversely to the drop in donations resulting from the economic downturn?  The exaggeration of such threats is well illustrated by an NSPCC spokesperson who recently said that  internet grooming posed a bigger risk to children than being knocked down by a car.

The need to establish the Falmouth White Witch Pagan  case as a case of 'ritualised abuse' should be seen within the following context above.

In the beginning the Satan Scare was created by fundamentalist Christians and picked up by the ever-greedy child care charities for funding purposes. The lie was reinforced by extremist Christian psychiatrists,  evangelistic Christian social workers,extreme feminist social engineers, born-again Christian victim imposters and fundamentalist policemen who, disguised as 'concerned' parties manipulated the secular professions and the willing media for their own sectarian ends.

You would have thought that, following the Clyde Inquiry over the Orkney SRA fiasco that those who believed in a pan-global satanic conspiracy to sexually abuse and kill children would have kept their heads down. They did, until ordinary folk like yourselves went back to sleep, and then they began a twenty year campaign to further their religious prejudices

by surreptitiously commanding debate out of public view, within the Psychiatric and therapeutic movements, the police and judiciary, and the ever-greedy child welfare charities.  

The SAFF said plainly RIGHT AT THE START in 1988 that these fundamentalist agent provocateurs were after one thing and one thing only. The suppression of the burgeoning religion of Neo-paganism using age-old blood libels and sectarian hatred based on the falsehood that all archaic non-Christian beliefs were linked with the devil.  It is straightforward competition for souls with the largest religious organisational structure winning the bad-mouthing game.

 The idea that pre-Christian religions were linked to devil worship is completely and utterly historically counterfeit. Any history professor
will tell you that, yet because the churches have consistently sold the public this lie over the two thousand years they have been in control of the Western world, the vast majority of people are more inclined to believe the lies than challenge  them.

We term such people Xists, because regardless of how intelligent they are they are indoctrinated into erring on the side of  prejudicial, unfair sectarian conclusions which were indoctrinated into them by the churches and society when they were themselves children.   They EXPECT pagans to do dastardly things and are more ready to believe big lies in connection with it - as the Falmouth case indicates. 

NOT THE FIRST TIME:

There's been 500 years of black-propaganda about paganism from the churches.


It was the Malleus Maleficarum which formalised the Vatican's View of  Possession and Devils and influences it even today.

The 15c Malleus Maleficarum was authorised by the papacy and caused the deaths of millions of innocent people using the same allegations which resurfaced in the Falmouth Case. You can see further information about this disgusting book and how it is even today influencing and promoting misogynist attitudes by going here.



Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse Case

TIMELINE

2000 (circa) Petrauske meets Solheim for the first Time:

2004 June 18th: Peter Solheim found murdered :

Witness 'A' identified Solheim: "I didn't recognise the man until a few years ago when he was on the television because he had been murdered. It was Peter Selvine (statement says Selvine, but she meant Solheim)." Source:".
Witness 'A' said she suffered pain for weeks after she was tied to a bed and raped by an unknown man when she was nearly ten and how, years later, she
recognised him when he was murdered and his picture was shown on television"

2004 July 8th:
Petrauske Interviewed by Falmouth Packet - see above column left.
Denies any pagan connection with Solheim murder. First publication of the photo above where Petrauske holds the metal  pentacle made for him by Solhiem. :

2004 December  Crimestoppers Reward first offered.

2005 Stanley Pirie tried for 'regular' sexual abuse against Witness 'A':
Witness 'A' does not mention Solheim nor Kemp nor Petrauske to the police or at the trial.
 

2006 April 26th Margaret James tried for Solheim Murder. Receives 20 year sentence.

2011 December.  Police arrest Kemp and Petrauske.


2012 November 26th:  Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse case begins

2012  December 14th Kemp and Petrauske found guilty.


What Can Pagans and Freethinkers Do To Stop This Evil Flow of Black Propaganda Against their Religion?


Look upon the Falmouth Case as an opportunity to present the true and socially responsible face of paganism.  Every time you see a Tweet or newspaper article or  Forum comment about the Falmouth Case which is defamatory to Paganism or Wicca or which repeats ignorant conclusions then consider commenting or Tweeting back to redress the balance.

Repudiate the idea that there is such a thing as Pagan Ritual Abuse at every juncture and be sure to include a link to this webpage. To make things easier we have added a  shortened  link below suitable for use in forums and on twitter.

http://bit.ly/VOk5nN

http://bit.ly/VOk4nN

ALERT OTHER PAGANS who many not be aware  of what is happening so that they too can rebutt any besmirching of their beliefs.

Join in with the SAFF's sterling work in protecting freedom of religious belief and in particular the rights of pagans.  Check out our complete website and begin contributing ideas and information to our FORUM to share with others.

Discover the legal position and what your local authority has to do to respect your religious beliefs. Bone up on them here:  UNHUMRITS

Please click here to go to the SAFF  Forum - You can leave a message anonymously or just read what others have to say.





PAGANS BEWARE - YOUR RELIGION IS IN THE SIGHTS OF THE RITUAL ABUSE AXIS - MORE FALSE CASES TO FOLLOW: MAKE SURE YOU ARE NOT AMONGST THEM


PAGANISM ON TRIAL

Peter Petrauske AKA German Pete

Wicca in the dock as State witch-hunting recommences - will you be next?

Falmouth 'White Witch' case uses historic 'blood libels'   against Paganism to push through claims of 'Ritualised Sex Abuse'

XISTS AND THERITUAL ABUSE AXIS: THE GENESIS OF SATANIC RITUAL CHILD ABUSE AND HOW THEY'VE BEEN AFTER NAILING PAGANISM FOR YEARS

In the beginning they called it Satanic Ritual Child Abuse. (SRA) They told you Satanists were  raping and killing children in  appalling rituals of human sacrifice. The public gasped in horror  but right at the start we said it was all sectarian lies - a disguised attack on the new religion of paganism by it's historical foe.

Then, it became clear that the victim imposters who gave first hand evidence of these claims were all christian fundamentalist agitators telling sectarian lies. We had been right. The public gasped in horror again.

Undetered the  witch-finders in social work hunted down little children from dysfunctional families so they could brainwash them into fantasising allegations against their parents and confirm the SRA claims, but lo - Rochdale, Orkney,.
 Manchester, Ayrshire, Epping and dozens of other false cases of SRA were the result. We said we told you so. The public gasped in horror at being duped a  third time but....

Click here to read more:
 
Although started in December 2011 the latest Satanic ritual child abuse test-case was worked-up by the Ritual Abuse Axis  in utmost secrecy. The Falmouth SRA case would be the very first to go to court which involved accusations of ritualised sexual child abuse against genuine pagans

Even though there have been dozens of failed cases over the past two decades in which claims of SATANIC abuse have featured the people accused in those cases were neither satanists nor witches but ordinary folk sucked into the madcap controversy who were subsequently cleared.

In the 23 years since the Satan Scare was first floated  the Falmouth case  is  the very first instance where a genuine pagan  has been prosecuted and is therefore of historic consequence.  The  implications  for Paganism are immense and this article has been writen primarily to make pagans aware of the dangerous situation they now find themselves in.

So important was the Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse case that the entire investigation and subsequent prosecution was kept under a veil of secrecy during the lead up to the trial.  The adult accusers were given absolute anonymity and gave much of their evidence  by video, (a facility introduced originally for children to avoid them being traumatised by the formality of the court and  appearing in front of their abusers) which in the context of an adult trial immediately gives a guilty impression to the jury.

Judge Graham Cottle even imposed a legal order banning media coverage of the case which further dramatised the hearing. . 

The first the public knew that a witch-hunt was in process was when BBC radio Cornwall successfully challenged the gagging order, which meant reporting of the proceedings could take place.
Congratulations must go to the BBC for doing the job a healthy media should be doing.

This made it possible for the public to see the workings of a modern-day witch-trial of mediaeval proportions
.


The prosecution's Inquisitorial approach was clear from the outset as defence barrister Sean Brunton, defending,  told the Jury

'medieval justice' was used to torture and kill people who behaved strangely or differently as soon as others began to point the finger of accusation.'
 

He was of course warning the Jury against falling for the old myths when he said:

'While those who don’t follow the crowd are criticised, it’s not yet illegal to be a weirdo.'

SPECTRAL EVIDENCE

The idea of Spectral Evidence was drawn from accusations of 'witnesses' in mediaeval witch-trials who claimed the accused had appeared to them in a dream or vision.  Rossel Hope Robbins writes in his seminal Encyclopaedia of Witchcraft & Demonology

"In most witch trials this evidence was decisive", ..and ... 
"On such evidence TENS OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE were executed"

In modern times, for Dream or Vision , read  Recovered Memories.

The evidence against the two accused was the word of their adult accusers, involving memories in childhood which went so far back (to three years old in one case) that most ordinary people would be unable to recall them at all, let alone recall memories with reliable accuracy, but the defence, which appeared to sleep-walk through the trial,  did not challenge the source of these memories or question  when they were first recalled.  They did not for instance check whether witness 'A' giving this testimony (who had beenunder  psychiatric treatment) had undergone any  recovered memory therapy. The discredited 'Recovered Memory syndrome now appears to have morphed with a modern version of the infamous 'spectral evidence' which brought mediaeval witch trials into utter contempt.

Clearly, the fact that Peter Petrauske was a genuine pagan believer and High Priest of his own coven was CRUCIAL to the story painted by the prosecution and witnesses giving evidence against him. The stories each witness gave were being aggregated into impressions of a Pagan Abuse Ring - a coven of paedophiles  intent on abusing multiple children during evil pagan ceremonies ;  thus confirming in the minds of the Jurors all the historic mega-accusations Satan Hunters in Social Work had alleged in a propaganda excercise lasting two decades. But the truth of the Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse case was far more complex and convoluted than that as we will relate.

In almost every historic case of sexual abuse the conclusion inevitably boils down to a choice between the word of the accuser and the word of the accused which is why an attempt to besmirch and discredit the reputation and intent of the accused is always present in any such trial.  The less real evidence there is the more strident is the attempt to discredit.   In a case in which occult involvement played a part the prosecution had this presented to them on a plate and  they focused on the Pagan Ritualised Abuse aspect. 
Ronald Hutton
The defence saw this coming and brought in expert witness Ronald Hutton, a History professor and pagan who had written many books on the subject.   Hutton did his best to convince the jury of the truth. That paganism is the original prehistoric religion of mankind and that none of its ceremonies or rites involve or abuse children.  That pagans are highly responsible about children and would inform the police immediately if they found anyone in their ranks abusing them in any way.

"Previously this week Dr Ronald Hutton, a professor of history who has written numerous books on the history of Paganism and Witchcraft, spoke about the religion WICCA that was part of a complex religion including Paganism.

“Nothing sexual is involved either with children or adults,” he declared.
Source

The message was that it was not possible for a Pagan Ring of child abusers to have existed in Cornwall for so many years without detection by Pagans themselves in the first instance, and the police shortly afterwards.

Those who have heard similar accusations before throughout the twenty four year reign of the Satan Scare will already be saying; Just a minute! This is the first occasion when a pagan has been tried and convicted for child abuse but there have been THOUSANDS of instances of Priests who have used their divine authority to abuse children and often done this in a church or by using  religious impedimentia (e.g. the case of the priest who raped an 8 year old girl by inserting a crucifix into her vagina see here) but we never saw headlines like:
 'Christian Gang Ritually Abuses Children' 
because it is obvious to all intelligent observers that it is paedophile priests who are at fault and not the religion of Christianity within which they work.  Renegade priests, even THOUSANDS of renegade priests do not undermine the genuine nature of the Christian Religion. We don't say; to avoid the thousands of paedophile priests we should ostracise or ban Christianity itself,  so why therefore was it  necessary  to portray  Paganism as entirely corrupt?

In the Falmouth case it appeared that the prosecution  wanted to have it's cake and eat it at the same time.  The key prosecutor Mr Beal told the jury that Kemp  had used the paraphernalia in paganism and witchcraft to scare the children he had abused. His actual words were:
"You put those robes on to frighten some little children. It was nothing to do with paganism or witchcraft – it was child abuse."
Those pagans who thought this was an olive branch should think again.  The Jack Kempprosecution took this stance ONLY when questioning Kemp because his defence was that he was not a witch or pagan.   Beal was trying to establish  the fact that Kemp's involvement in the abuse was simply one of perversion.  The  prosecution WAS blaming the religion of Paganism because the key message was that the existence and activities of the two accused were linked to the group activities of a Pagan  Coven lead by Petrauske.  Without that link each man would have had to be tried on the evidence relating to his own indpendent abuse which was weak in relation to a network of abusers.  That is, some witnesses inculpated Kemp in abuse but not in a religious framework.  Those witnesses did not inculpate Petrauske. 

Thus even though Jack Kemp (Petrauske's co-accused) made it clear several times during his trial that he wasn't a member of Petrauske Coven, had not been initiated into it and claimed to be a member of a Spiritualist church (spiritualist churches are Christian in orientation) the prosecution insisted that he was part of this supposed Coven of Abusers spanning three decades.

The barrister said: "You put those robes on to frighten some little children...."

Kemp replied: "I never wore robes. It's not my religion."

Compare this with Petrauske who was clearly a pagan and who told the police what his religious beliefs were immediately that he was questioned.

Petrauske told police officers:
“I am a white witch, a pagan and not a Christian..."  
Thus we have a  dichotomy where one defendant pleaded that he WAS a witch and the other pleaded that he WAS NOT a witch as part of their individual defences to allegations of ritualised abuse.  Petrauske appeared to be saying. Don't find me guilty just because I believe in the religion of paganism, and Kemp was saying don't blame me for ritual abuse because  I am not a pagan.

So, was the abuse Pagan Ritual Abuse or was it just a gang of abusers?   Was the ritual perpetrated as a cloak to disguise a gang of paedophiles or was the abuse part of an evil religious belief which required the debasing and sacrifice of children?   This was the catch-as-catch-can of this trial and the prosecution had decided to put Paganism squarely in the dock.

Ms Martin, Kemp's defence barrister tried again saying;

'The pagan aspect is high drama. But it has absolutely nothing to do with Jack Kemp. That is the biggest red herring of this particular case.'

The catch-22 was that during the trial it was revealed that Kemp had previously been convicted for child abuse in 1972 and he was said to have been friends with Stanley Pirie, a paedophile who had been sentenced to 12 years in prison in the same court in 2005 largely from the testimony of the same woman (witness 'A' ) who was now giving evidence against Kemp and  Petrauske.

 She was the main witness whose testimony tied together Kemp and Petrauske in incidents of abuse within a ritual framework.  However in contrast Petrauske had no previous convictions.   This put the Jury in a bind.  It looked like Kemp and Pirie might have been a paedophile group but at Pirie's trial  witness 'A' had made no mention of ritual abuse.  If the Jury believed Kemp's story that he was not a Witch and therefore a common-or-garden opportunistic paedophile the allegations of Pagan Ritual Abuse did not fit his case and they would need to consider the allegations against Petrauske in a different light.  Because Petrauske had no previous convictions and he was blackened by association with Kemp they might very well have to  find him not guilty and Kemp more likely guilty. However it was impossible to find Petrauske not-guilty in the scenario of Ritual Abuse which the prosecution had set up as his belief in Paganism was key to it all.

When Jo Martin, defending Kemp, asked witness 'A' why the woman had not mentioned Kemp or Petrauske during the 2005 trial of Pirie, she replied:
"Because I was ashamed and feared what they would do to me if I ever told. I can't forget some of the things they did."
Witness 'A' continued to say that she had not mentioned the pair during police interviews about Pirie because she had only been asked about Pirie.

She said
she had first mentioned the two defendants during counselling sessions following the Pirie trial and said they had "destroyed" her life.

These are serious charges which affect the whole of Paganism so regardless of any sympathy we may have with Witness 'A' it is important to chase down these important aspects.  

 How could adult Witness 'A'  be so frightened of Kemp and Petrauske in 2005 that she dare not tell about their abuse, yet felt free to tell the police everything that Stanley Pirie did?   

Why was she the key witness against Pirie but did  not think of mentioning to the police about Kemp and Petrauske? 

The defence never posited the crucial question. 'Did you only recall Kemp and Petrauske due to recovered memory therapy undergone after the Pirie case and during counselling sessions with therapists who believed in satanic ritual child abuse? '

The answer to that would have been interesting because, Ms Martin, Kemp's defence barrister referred to a letter from Witness 'A' 's psychiatrist to her GP in which he stated;
the woman (witness 'A') told him she had been a virgin when she married. 

Witness (A) agreed that was what she had told her psychiatrist because  "it made it easier."

Witness (A) was therefore admitting that she lied to suit her predicament.

Now we are not for one moment suggesting that Witness 'A' did not suffer abuse.  What we are pointing out is that her own statements throw some doubt on the development of this story and there is a chance of ordinary abuse having been re-defined as Pagan or Satanic and thus played into the hands of the Ritual Abuse Axis.

Now read this: 

During evidence Witness 'A' sensationally also accused a man named Peter Solheim of raping her when she was a child.  She said he was also part of the coven that Kemp and Petrauske were involved in. She remembered him after seeing a photograph of him on TV after he was sensationally murdered.  But Solheim was murdered in 2004 almost a year before Pirie had been brought to trial and most probably during the period when Witness (A) was being questioned by police about Pirie.  

The defence should have questioned Witness 'A' in detail about this situation but failed to do so.   Apparently witness 'A'  had not only decided not to mention the abuse by Kemp and Petrauske to the police but she had also not mentioned Solheim to the police whilst a murder investigation was ongoing about him even though she has admitted she was aware of it having seen it on TV! 

 
It is important to realise that when Witness 'A'  gave testimony at Pirie's trial in 2005 she did not once mention occultism, wicca, paganism or ritual abuse.  Pirie was sentenced for 'ordinary' sexual child abuse.  

We can only conclude logically that her memories of the involvement of Solheim in Petrauske's 'ritual abuse coven ' occurred in restrospect  after those images were confabulated during counselling sessions following the Pirie trial.

Additionally, Petrauske's defence counsel did not properly challenge witness 'A' concerning the 25,000.00 GBP compensation she had received following the Pirie case.

"During cross examination yesterday the witness agreed that she had received nearly £25,000 compensation from the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board but declared: “I gave it all away, to anyone, it was dirty money... I never wanted people to know about what had happened but I had to do what is right.” Source:

The questions which should have naturally followed from the defence were these:
(1) When did she first learn of the fact that she might be subject to compensation and how much did she believe it might be?
(2) Who did she give the money away to and when?
(3) Will she be applying for compensation following this case if the defendants are found guilty?

Unfortunately the defence was sadly lacking in this case and these crucial questions were not asked.

Paganism on Trial

The ultimate deciding factor therefore was not whether Kemp and/or Petrauske were guilty of child abuse but whether there was such a thing as ritualised abuse that went on in Pagan ceremonies.  In short it was PAGANISM WHICH WAS ON TRIAL.  The Falmouth case had become a test-case for the existence of child abuse as part of pagan worship.

This paradoxicality was one which appeared frequently in mediaeval Witch-trials and is often used to overcome a lack of evidence to support the allegations being made.  Look at this:
"Witches work at night and in secret AND CLEAR PROOF OF SUCH DEEDS IS IMPOSSIBLE".
In other words, juries must believe their worst fears despite the paucity of evidence.  These were the words of Henry Bouguet, a lawyer in a 16th century witch-trial. They caused an innocent woman to be executed. You can read more about the similarities between medieaval witch trials and the Falmouth case here:

If the prosecution in the Falmouth case succeeded it would open a completely new and very wide field of targets for the Satan Hunters.  The 'Occult Census' proved that there are about 250,000 pagans in the U.K. but only about 450 genuine satanists   The Child Scare Industry now has a bandwagon of enormous proportions.

Note: Though 1,893 people quipped that they were satanists in the 2011 census most of these can be classified along with those who also claimed to be 'Jedi Knights'. Satanists do have a sense of humour but are not likely to aid the State to hunt them down.  Neo-pagans on the other hand seek to legitimise their religion and various campaigns in pagan newsletters and their empire-building Pagan Federation   ,as this report here proves, started to enthuse pagans to mark down their religion on the 2011 census form. Their naivety is clear from the Falmouth  Pagan Ritual Abuse trial because those sectarians who have made a career of besmirching and defaming paganism now have a census figure of at least 80,000 pagans and druids etc to extrapolate to the authorities as an increased risk to children.

Did Extreme Sentencing Reflect Bias against Paganism?

On the morning of the 14th of  December 2012 the Jury at Truro Crown Court returned a guilty verdict on Peter Petrauske 72 and Jack Kemp 69. 

Presumably because Petrauske was the High Priest of his  small coven  he  got the  biggest sentence of 18 years.

Worryingly Kemp had a prior conviction for child abuse and was a close associate of jailed Stanley Pirie but was given a lighter sentence of 14 years.

These are swingeing sentences for 'historic' sexual abuse which are out of all proportion to normal cases of rape. According to the Rape Crisis Centre  the average sentence for rape is four years.
'The average sentence seems to be around four years although we do know of many cases where this was much less.'

 Example  List of  Priests and Clergy convicted in child abuse cases and the light sentences they were given.

Stephen Allen, Priest, (77)  was sentenced to one year in prison in March of this year, for sexually abusing four boys 45 years ago.

Former Christian Brother John McKenna was given a three-year suspended sentence in 2002 for abusing boys between 1968 and 1970.

McCormack pleaded guilty in 2007 to fondling five boys while he served as a Catholic priest. He was sentenced to five years in prison.

Christian Brother Patrick John Kelly,, was jailed for eight years in 1999 for sexual assaults on 11 boys over a 12-year period.

Gordon Wateridge, was jailed for two years after being found guilty of a string of sex attacks on teenage girls at Haute Garonne, Jersey.

Christian Brother Donal Dunne, was jailed for two years at Tullamore Circuit Court in 1999 after a lifetime of abuse which spanned his entire 45-year career.

 A  priest who sexually abused six boys at a Catholic boarding school has been  sentenced to six years in jail. William Green, 67, abused pupils aged 11
    to 15 between 1975 and   1987

In June of 2009, Christian Brother Sean Drummond (61) pleaded guilty to 36 counts of indecent assault in the 1960s.
 
Priest Peter Halliday, 61, from Farnborough, was sentenced to two and a half years in prison after pleading guilty at Winchester Crown court to ten counts of indecent assault.

Our files show MANY other cases where priests have been given desultory sentences totally unlike the one handed out to Petrauske (see here)
Nobody has any sympathy for a child-abuser but was this eye-watering sentence given because of what Petrauske actually did or was it elevated because of a general revulsion over the idea of Pagan Ritual Child abuse?  After a vitupertive dressing-down of the guilty men Judge Graham Cottle told Petrauske 'he was likely to die in prison'.

The SAFF has spent two decades collecting data and statistics on cases of  sexual  abuse in a religious context.  In particular the THOUSANDS of cases of  Priestly Abuse but also of child abuse by ordinary paedophiles who used religion as a cover. We can say that  the  courts  almost always give more sympathetic sentences to clergy and ex-clergy, often derisory sentences which astonish victims.

For example, one day after Petrauske was given a virtual life sentence for Pagan Ritual Abuse, John Haley Dossor, an Anglican priest who sexually abused teenage boys, was also jailed.
"Father John Haley Dossor, pleaded guilty to six counts of indecent assault relating to two boys aged as young as 13. Norwich Crown Court also heard that Dossor accepted he had abused a third boy between 15 and 20 times, although he was not charged with these attacks. The offences happened when the 71-year-old, of Kirton, near Felixstowe, Suffolk, was working at St Mary's Church in Hadleigh in the early 1990s.
Jailing Dossor for one year and 10 months,
Judge Mark Lucraft said: "You sexually abused these teenage boys who were committed to your care for recreation and education."

One year and ten months.  The Judge did not mention whether  71 year old Dossor was likely or unlikely to die in prison.  Source:

You can see an example of similarly mild sentences in the panel alongside (right) and you might like also to compare the Falmouth Case sentences with a recent case (May 2013) in Plymouth in which the same Judge Graham Cottle (who popularly 'sentenced Petrauske to die in prison' )  gave a well known artist a suspended sentence for doing much the same thing. 

Graham Ovenden gets suspended sentence for child sexual offences

An internationally renowned artist has been given a 12-month jail sentence, suspended for two years, after being found guilty of a string of sexual offences against former child models.

Sentencing Graham Ovenden at Plymouth crown court, Judge Graham Cottle told Ovenden: “There can be no doubt that at that time you had a sexual interest in children.”

Ovenden, 70, who studied under the pop artist Sir Peter Blake, was convicted of six charges of indecency with girls and one allegation of indecent assault on girls as young as 6.

For decades Ovenden lived and worked at Barley Splatt, an estate and neo-gothic mansion deep in the heart of Bodmin Moor, Cornwall. It was here some of his victims claimed he had committed offences against them in the 70s and 80s.

Ovenden denied that he had assaulted any of the children, who were as young as six. He claimed he was the target of a witch-hunt and his images of children were all about capturing them in a “state of grace”.

Source:


It is interesting to conjecture whether,  if Petruaske had been an 'internationally renowned artist' instead of a German who believed in an unpopular religion,  he would be a free man today?

Thus the  harsh sentence handed out to Petrauske was, we believe, an indication of the Judge reflecting society's revulsion at the apparent existence of Pagan Ritual Abuse in Covens and not simply punishment for the crimes committed.   The point is that, whether or not Petrauske and Kemp were actually guilty PAGANISM DOES NOT ABUSE CHILDREN AS PART OF ITS RITES  AND SHOULD NOT BE OFFICIALLY REVILED FOR IT. This is a direct breach of the British Human Rights Act. All authorities including the judiciary should protect the religious rights of citizens not travest them.

Contradictions Abound In This Trial

There are plenty of worrying contradictions in the Falmouth case for those with common sense.   

Contradiction 1:  Kemp was accused of being part of a Coven of abusing White Witches but there is little evidence that Kemp was a witch or even a pagan.   Kemp denied being involved in any form of Paganism - he said he was actually a member of a spiritualist Church. If this was true then the idea that there was a Network of Pagan Abusers in Cornwall fails.

Ms Martin, Kemp's defence, clearly told the jury that:   '... Jack Kemp is not involved in paganism.'   He had been to 'two or three' pagan meetings as an observer and some social events she said, but that this had been in the mid-to-late 1990s, after the alleged abuse took place
Source:

Yet a foundation stone of the 'pagan ritualised abuse' allegations against the defendants  was that Kemp, Petrauske and other people they knew were members of  a Witch's Coven which met regularly ('three times a week') for many years and abused children whilst doing it.

There is ample evidence that Petrauske is a pagan and he openly admitted this to the police. He was apparently well known in the Falmouth area and there are press photographs of him wearing robes and standing in front of a genuine pagan altar .  He has also  received coverage in the local press for being a pagan like the extended article alongside (left) in the  Falmouth Packet from  2004  where Petrauske  was very open about his beliefs and his connections. In particular with the late Peter Solheim , whose murder was sensationally injected into the trial by Witness 'A'. She said he (Solheim)  was involved in the same Pagan Ritual Abuse. In the light of this Petrauske's openess in the article (alongside) displays a naivety which is hard to correlate with someone whose coven was alledgedly ritually abusing children at the time! 

The point here, which we are heartily sick of having to repetitively state,  is that Paganism is not Satanism. Often the two words are used simultaneously by many ignorant people, particularly ardent Christians, yet they are as alike as chalk and cheese.  However Petrauske's defence did not make this distinction clear to the court nor were the definitions debated;  so rumours about Satanic Abuse which have been cycling around in the popular mind for decades were abstracted from one and projected unjustly onto the other.

(N.B.: We will have more to say about the mispresented Solheim Case below.)

A Dagger Through The Heart of Truth

Contradiction 2: Although predictably the prosecution has used SRA motifs to try to sway the jury these were sometimes clever exaggerations backed by inuendo which were further magnified by the sensationalism of the press:

For instance almost all the newspapers quoted the use of 'daggers ' in the alleged ritual abuse.  Petrauske appears to have owned the 'regulation ' witchcraft Athame dagger  as well as a ceremonial Sword (both used for symbolic purposes in Paganism).   Much was made of these but the only accusation about these actually being used  was when the court was told by one witness that:
"She had been tied to a chair and blindfolded, and on another occasion her wrists were bound and a ceremonial dagger was drawn over her body."
Source

Did the prosecution want the jury to jump to the conclusion that the victim had been somehow cut or tortured with the dagger?  Obviously this is not the case otherwise there would have been scars and , in a trial marked by overstatement, it would have warranted a rather more vivid description  than 'drawn over ' .   Strangely, the woman who related  this story wasn't actually complaining of being sexually abused.
"The High Priestess ran knives up and down her body and around her neck, and she felt hot wax being poured down her stomach, she claimed.
Note carefully that the witness said that it was a WOMAN and NOT either of the two defendants who did this.  The perpetrator of the knife incident was a woman but she was not on trial. The situation was used to discredit the defendants through guilt-by-association.  When asked to explain what had been done to her the victim said she felt like a rag doll that somebody was experimenting on but she never once claimed that she had been sexually abused during this ceremony.
Source:

Don't you think this is strange?  That the only witnesses claiming to having been present at a ceremony within recent memory was not claiming to have been sexually abused and 'incriminated' a woman priestess in her 'torture' not the two men who were being put on trial?

The Daily Mirror elevated these motifs into:
"Victims were allegedly plied with alcohol before being ordered to strip naked in front of a crowd of men wearing ceremonial robes and who used daggers and wax as part of ritualistic sex abuse."  Source:
But as we have shown there was no ritualistic sex abuse - the witness was not complaining about sexual abuse in that context.

This Is Cornwall 
went even further:
Prosecutors say Jack Kemp, 69, and Peter Petrauske, 72, were members of a
witches' coven
whose members donned robes and used daggers to launch sex
attacks on girls in Cornwall. 
Source:

Note the plurals, even though only ONE instance of the use of a dagger was given by the witness and she certainly did not say  that she was threatened with it to get sex.

One instance is magnified to many instances by the Xist British media and the inference is that it happens frequently in child abusing Pagan Covens. PAGANISM ON TRIAL!

 In fact some pagan initition rites do use the sacred Athame dagger  to symbolically 'pass power' and it is held to the breast of the novitiate during this process.   This appears to me to be a much more likely explanation as to what was going on.  Additionally, as lighted candles and tapers are de-rigeur in all pagan ceremonies it is not uncommon for hot wax to be spilled by accident.  There is absolutely no use of hot wax in pagan rites otherwise.  The media inferrence that the witness was 'tortured' with hot wax is entirely erroneous.

Petrauske was found Red-handed with the Tools he used in the Abuse

Contradition 3:  It was inferred that Petrauske was found red-handed with the paraphernalia of abuse.
"Among items police found at his home were a suitcase containing a ceremonial dagger, a cup and table covering, books relating to witchcraft and paganism, a blue and silver gown, a purple gown, a black eye mask, a red robe, a black leather whip, a gold chain and dagger, a black handled sword and a bag containing candles, incense and lavender."

The implication is that these were items which had been used in the alleged abuses and thus proved beyond doubt Petrauske's guilt .  But the truth is that ALL witches have some of these items as part of their ceremonial paraphernalia.  ANY witch or pagan would possess most of these things in order to pursue their religion's ceremonies.  Just as a Catholic Priest would also possess robes, a chalice, candles, incense etc.   The reality is that these things were not 'hidden' and they were not 'found' by the police.  They were simply part of Petrauske's permanent temple which you could see by walking into his flat as the picture at the top of the page proves There was absolutely NO evidence to suggest that any of the items discovered in his flat had been used in any crimes; yet that is the  impression that was given to the Jury.

If possessing a sword, a dagger, candles, a cup, an altar  cloth, robes and books relating to witchcraft was prime facie evidence of ritualised abuse the police would have to arrest a quarter of a million pagans in the U.K. alone.  AND THAT IS THE DANGER in the promiscuous logic used in this Witch-Trial.

The finding of these things did nothing other than prove that Petrauske was a pagan; something he had immediately admitted to the police when arrested anyway.  This jumping-to-conclusions reminds me of the parent who had his child kidnapped from him by social services in the Orkney fiasco due them having discovered a copy of Dennis Wheatley's THE DEVIL RIDES OUT novel on his bookshelf.  He was just an ordinary person with no connection to paganism or the occult.

Chanting Naked In The Moonlight

Contradiction 4: All the allegations came from adult women who had remembered historic abuse during childhood.  Witness 'A' said that she remembered being taken to a Coven meeting  where she and 12 other children were ritually abused at which  Kemp and Petrauske attended. 
Her evidence spoke of being about three when she was first abused, and five when she went to a ritual attended by a number of men and women, together with up to 12 children. Among those present were Kemp and Petrauske, the high priest.  Source:
"The chanting stuck in my head for weeks," she said. "I didn't understand what it was all about, I just thought they were weird. I was warned that if I was naughty they would hurt me, that they had special powers.
This statement was not challenged by the defence. It begged the question that if the chanting stuck in her head for weeks she would still be able to remember it now but she was never asked to repeat it before the jury or even describe what it was like.   The ability of children to remember nursery rhymes almost before they can talk;  and later on as adults to remember those ditties to entertain their own children, is well known, yet the defence failed this simple method to test what and what not witness 'A' could remember from that time.

In regular Paganism magical work is undertaken to help people in the coven and also to heal outsiders who have asked for it.   This involves circle-dancing and chanting to build-up power which increases in tempo until the 'energies ' are at their height whence the magic is sent-forth into a talisman or other device and the participants fall to the floor and rest.   These chants are repetitive and simple to remember.   In most covens today this circle-dancing  is done whilst robed but some hold that it has to be done naked so that the earth currents can be acumulated for the magic. 

Therefore adults dancing naked is common-place in some covens but this has no sexual or sadistic connotation.  Their nudity is no more significant than the Nudist Beaches which are welcomed in the South West. 

Ring-a-ring-o-roses
is a well known circle-dance for children. Could a corrupted memory of it be the source of some of these recollections?
We will never know because the defence never asked the questions which should have been asked.  What was clear was that members of Petrauske's coven testified on oath that they always wore robes during ceremonies.

Falmouth Case Does Not Reflect Genuine Paganism Yet Will be Used by the Ritual Abuse Axis To Attack Wicca.

The Falmouth case certainly does not prove what the pro-SRAMists would like to pass it off as;  firm evidence that babies and young children are being evily and violently abused  by pagans because of some nationwide Witchcraft Conspiracy to commit human sacrifice to dark gods in order to undermine good society.

Neither does it indicate that there is a 'network ' of   such people.   Only Kemp and Petrauske  were arrested and there is no firm evidence that any other Pagans were involved in the 'abuses '.
Several women members of Petrauske's coven were called to the trial as witnesses to his good character but, strangely, considering that one witness had complained that she had been abused by a High Priestess no other members of his coven were indicted.

"Faith-Witchcraft" ; The new Jingle for the Child Scare Industry

The glee with which the Ritual Abuse Axis used the Falmouth case to support their 24 year old failed contentions about SRA was first revealed when a week or so prior to the actual trial the outgoing Children 's Commissioner fleetingly mentioned it in a short interview answering wide criticism of the departments most recent claims about 16,000 teenage girls being at risk from Asian Gangs. In the interview for Channel 4 TV news he gave a list of threats to children and also slipped in;

'there 's also faith-Witchcraft in Cornwall '.

Indicating that here was a cause celebre which had infiltrated high eschelons within the Child Scare Industry. 

The use of the term 'Faith-Witchcraft' is another euphemism for 'Satanic'.   It is how believers in the Myth of Satanic Ritual Abuse corrupted the incidence of Christian Child Exorcism Abuse  by blaming it on African Witchcraft.   The recent government report 'The Witch-Child Action Plan' (see here).  Has given the green light yet again for witch-finders to overstep the mark. Not because witches are in any way involved in abusing children in exorcism ceremonies but because Xists mis-reported the many instances of it occuring in fringe Christian groups and churches.

 
It was Christian pastors who 'diagnosed' that children were possessed with the devil and then accused them of being 'little witches'.  These so-called Christians accused children of witchcraft and put them through inevitable torture during impromptu exorcism ceremonies. Some poor children actually died |(see here).  The Bitish media recorded this not as Christian Child Exorcism Abuse but as 'Witchcraft'!   Xists in government made the same prejudicial error and together with the Satan Hunter charities invented the term Faith-Witchcraft as a halfway house which, as you can imagine, absolutely delighted the Satan Hunters in the Child Scare Industry who were immediately reinvigorated and strengthened in their activities. 

It is no surprise to us therefore that a case like Falmouth turned up when it did and has been lumped under this new definition. We confidently expect a rash of such cases as the social services witch-hunters get back to work persecuting pagans and we already have a number of calls for help on our files where suspicious Christian social workers have  used parents' pagan beliefs as a fulcrum to take away their kids.  Astonishingly in one instance they arranged for  the pagan parents visiting rights to take place in a church hall complete with altar and started brainwashing their kids into Christianity!


The Witch-Child Action Plan was the first government document to make reference to Celtic Witchcraft and Paganism in reference to child abuse even though there had been absolutely no evidence of it occurring! .  Note well that the document made NO mention whatsoever of SATANIC abuse and, predictably, no mention of abuse in Black Christian Churches which are the root of the problem of child exorcism.  Xist society had again superimposed it's own evil onto the world of  paganism.

The Witch-Child Action Plan was published by the Department for Education. We have been trying to warn them of the dangers for nearly a year but they just keep giving us the run around.   Just like the NSPCC did prior to the Rochdale, Manchester, Orkney and Ayr scandals. We have told them that they have basically given a green light to fundamentalists to do their worst and kick-start the Satan Scare yet again.  Time will prove us right, again.

All this involvement of government at high level indicates that the inexorable pro-SRA propaganda from the child scare industry  may have caused civil servants not only to ride roughshod over the religious rights of pagans but also to ignore the conclusions in the government's own 1994 report The Extent and Nature of Ritualised Abuse by Prof. Jean La Fontaine which firmly concluded that allegations were fictional and driven by Christian fundamentalist activists.  But then again, even though the media and public scathingly ridiculed social work directors and police officers for attending Satan Seminars in the early 1990s, it didn't take long for the Satan Hunters to wheedle their way into favour again and Police forces around the country have been paying to attend special Satan Seminars  full of sectarian lies and deceit since 2005. (see How British Police Fell For Fakery here)

The SAFF is on record as saying in 1994 that the only thing which stopped the first Satanic Panic from doing massive social damage right across the nation was the circumspect and critical attitude of the police to claims of Satanic Ritual Abuse.   All they were doing of course was applying normal criminology tactics to test the allegations made to them but with the new Satan Seminars and the conscious infiltration of evangelical police officers throughout police forces throughout the U.K. ( see Prayer Cops here for background)   along with a whole tranche of SRA believing lawyers and psychiatrists there is now little to stop a renewed victimisation of  citizens and their families if they just happen to believe in unusual things, live eccentric lives or adhere to new religious beliefs.  Be warned, a witch-hunt is ongoing which will suck-in many innocents..

Even though there have been dozens of failed cases over the past two decades in which claims of SATANIC abuse have featured, the Falmouth case  is  the first instance where genuine pagans have been implicated and is therefore of historic consequence. There was the Isle of Lewis case in July 2004  in which a pagan family was accused but these claims were proved false during the police investigation and did not go to trial.

The repercussions of the Falmouth case are not finished yet and Pagans throughout the U.K. should be careful not to fall into the trap of providing the Ritual Abuse Axis with more grist to their mill.  Before any social workers knock on your door you should check the column (left) to see how you can help stop this campaign to deny you your religious freedom  and also acquaint yourself with your religious rights under the British Human Rights Act (here) and not simply assume that you will be protected by British Justice.

John Freedom, Mortlake , Winter Solstice 2012ev

The Peter Solheim Killing:

Black Magic Sacrifice - or just plain murder for money?

In an attempt to blacken the characters of the defendants the prosecution in the Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse case went with the back-story given to them by Witness 'A'  who linked Kemp and Petrauske with the murder of  Peter Solheim a Budock Parish Councillor whose mutilated body was found floating in the sea off the Lizard. The  local and national media went wild when it was revealed that Solheim was a pagan who was said to favour Black Magic.

 The idea that he was killed or sacrificed for occult purposes by a local Black Magic coven became hot gossip but there was no such connection and the police eventually discounted it.   Solheim's  links with Druid organisations and other covens in the area made splash news and became the focal point of media interest.  The Police soon discovered that this was nonsense and tried to dissuade the media from this course but Xists being Xists the case was well remembered as 'occult'. Pity they did not recall the following statement by the police:
Satan Crazed Councillor Murdered
Yesterday Detective Inspector Neil Best told the Falmouth Packet:
"The (occult aspect ) is a subject we are trying to bring focus away from. We are looking at what happened to Mr Solheim and his history is important but it is not a main focus for us."

However the media didn't seem bothered about the truth and kept up the 'occult' connections throughout the investigation, including a special interview with Peter Petrauske in 2004 who de-mystified the entire episode (see above leftmost column)

By 23 December 2004  a Crimestoppers Trust reward of 5,000.00 was being offered.

A REWARD of £5,000 is being offered in a bid to try and track down the murderer of Budock parish councillor 'Peter Solheim. The Crimestoppers Trust has agreed to assist the investigation with the offer of up to £5,000 as a reward for information that leads to the arrest, charge and conviction. 56-year-old Peter Solheim's body was pulled from the sea some five miles from Blackhead, Falmouth, during the morning of Friday, June 18, 2004.   A post-mortem has shown that he drowned but he had also suffered additional injuries. Since that time, detectives have been working from an incident room based at Falmouth and have interviewed more than l,500 people.  At present, no one has been charged with his murder.
Note that there was no mention of the occult. Unfortunately the media did not let it rest and sensational coverage increased  until  the police brought Solheim's wife to trial for the murder.  Predictably coverage of the trial by the media then became low key, (presumably to avoid readers remembering that earlier their local rag had inferred that Solheim's death was a black magic sacrifice) but the following opening statement from the prosecution makes the police investigation abundantly clear:

The long-standing lover of a parish councillor with interests in paganism
and witchcraft drugged, mutilated and murdered him then dumped his body five
miles out to sea, a court was told yesterday.

Margaret James, 57, attacked Peter Solheim, 56, and killed him in a "most
gruesome" fashion after discovering that he was about to leave her and marry
another lover,
Truro Crown Court was told.

Her motives were a "combination of hatred, jealousy, revenge and a desire to
get her hands on his money and start a new life somewhere else",
said Sarah
Munro, QC, prosecutin
g.     (Source: This is Cornwall:  Richard Savill 26/04/2006)

So, as per usual, the real facts of the matter had no connection with Solheim's interest in paganism and came down to the usual avaricious motives for murder.   Ironically the judge presiding at James's trial was Graham Cottle, the same one who sentenced Petrauske and Kemp.

Margaret James was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison for murder.    However the image given to local people was that pagan mischief was involved and the idea of a network of black-magic covens in the area  became accepted rumour in the minds of those who are predisposed to see it.

Fast Forward seven years and within days of the Falmouth Pagan Ritual Abuse Case being concluded the despicable ThisIsCornwall  began working-up the Solheim connections and describing the Solheim case as 'still open' with this headline:

Witchcraft trial echoed grisly murder case which 'has never been closed'

This misleading statement is typical of the sensationalism of the press which has created witch-hysteria in the minds of local residents. Is it any wonder that dysfunctional women who are undergoing psychiatric care are ready to point the finger of guilt at anyone involved in the occult?

The Solheim case is still 'open' in the sense that the police believe that diminutive Margaret James could not have acted alone but they have no firm evidence to say that there actually were any accomplices; who her accomplices are, whether there was only one accomplice or more of them and they certainly have no clue whatsoever what the religious beliefs of any accomplices might be yet ThisIsCornwall goes ahead with the inference that there is some Black Magic Killer Coven loose in the South West!   Completely ignoring the fact that with a 20 year sentence at 57 years of age Margaret James would have to be  really, really, really  stupid not to have bargained her way into a lighter sentence by informing on any 'accomplices' to Solheim's murder.

Watch This Space...

John Freedom, Mortlake, Winter Solstice 2012ev



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