CM attempted ‘grossly improper’ interference in police investigation, McGrail Inquiry report says

Chief Minister Fabian Picardo attempted “grossly improper” interference in a police investigation in which Hassans senior partner James Levy, his friend and mentor, was a suspect, Sir Peter Openshaw, the chairman of the McGrail Inquiry, found in his long-awaited report published today.

Sir Peter, a retired UK High Court judge, found there was no actual interference in the police investigation, which continued its normal course and months later resulted in Mr Levy, who was never arrested or charged, being “exonerated” by police.

But he was highly critical of the actions of the Chief Minister during a “fraught” meeting in No.6 Convent Place on May 12, 2020, a central element of the evidence heard by the McGrail Inquiry.

He found Mr Picardo had “berated” former police Commissioner Ian McGrail even as officers attended Hassans with a search warrant against Mr Levy, describing this as “a grossly improper attempt to interfere in a legitimate police investigation and operation”.

Sir Peter found that Mr Picardo’s actions in the days after the search warrant also amounted to “grossly improper” attempts by the Chief Minister to influence the police investigation into the alleged “hacking and sabotage” of the National Security Centralised Intelligence System [NSCIS], and into an alleged conspiracy to defraud Bland, the private company that operates the system.

In a live ministerial broadcast on GBC as the report was published, Mr Picardo acknowledged the criticisms but said he had been advised they were "legally unfair and contradictory", adding he would consider a legal challenge.

The McGrail Inquiry was tasked with looking into the reasons and circumstances leading to the early retirement of former police Commissioner Ian McGrail in June 2020, after a 36-year career and halfway through his term in the top post at the Royal Gibraltar Police.

Mr McGrail alleged “misconduct and corruption” at the highest levels of government, insisting he was “muscled out” after being placed under huge pressure over the conduct of a live criminal investigation.

Those allegations were “denied and roundly rejected” by the Government parties, who said Mr McGrail retired because he knew he had lost the confidence of the Chief Minister and the then interim Governor, Nick Pyle, over cumulative issues including his handling of a fatal collision at sea involving an RGP vessel in March 2020 and a "shockingly bad" inspection report of the force.

In the 706-page report, Sir Peter found that Mr McGrail “did not give the best available information” in the immediate aftermath of the collision and that this “seriously damaged” Mr Pyle’s trust and confidence in the former Commissioner.

He rejected allegations that Mr Pyle had been “manipulated” and found his view that a change of leadership was needed at the RGP “an entirely reasonable conclusion”.

But Sir Peter found too that the process leading to the former Commissioner’s retirement was seriously flawed because McGrail had not been properly informed of the complaint against him or given a chance to respond, adding the Gibraltar Police Authority had been “misled” by the Chief Minister.

Sir Peter found the former Commissioner retired early because he felt he was “unfairly and unlawfully” being compelled to do so, and because the pressure he was under was having a detrimental impact on his health and personal life.

While the process leading to the retirement was “procedurally defective”, Sir Peter accepted that those procedural irregularities “might have been cured” had a proper process been followed.

He declined to speculate on what might have happened had that been the case but declined too to recommend an apology or compensation to Mr McGrail.

Sir Peter made a number of recommendations aimed at addressing conflicts of interest in public affairs, ensuring proper procedures were followed and documented in the event of a similar situation in future, and strengthening the GPA’s independence and governance of the RGP.

OPERATION DELHI

During the main hearing, the Inquiry was told that the police investigation, known as Operation Delhi, stemmed from a commercial dispute between Bland and two of its former employees, who had set up a company called 36 North in the hope of obtaining the government contract.

The contract was to be transferred by agreement between the companies but a dispute arose over ownership of the underlying software and there were allegations the system had been tampered with.

Mr Picardo said that, on learning of that dispute, he had ordered that the contract should remain with Bland.

The matter was complicated by the fact that Mr Levy and Hassans were shareholders in 36 North, and that Mr Picardo also held a small stake in the company through his sabbatical partnership of the law firm.

That was one of the many reasons why Sir Peter felt the Chief Minister should have steered well clear of any contact with Mr Levy over the investigation.

Mr Picardo believed the RGP’s decision to apply for a search warrant to seize the electronic devices of a senior lawyer who played a key role in the Rock’s economy risked damage to Gibraltar as a financial services jurisdiction.

He felt the warrant had been sought on flimsy evidence and that a lawyer of Mr Levy’s standing should have been afforded an opportunity to cooperate voluntarily with the RGP, whose officers could have obtained a production order asking him to hand over electronic devices, rather than an intrusive search warrant.

Additionally, the Chief Minister believed Mr McGrail lied to him on May 12 in No.6 Convent Place by suggesting that Chris Rocca, the Director of Public Prosecutions [DPP], had advised the RGP to seek a search warrant.

But Sir Peter found the DPP had given no such advice and that, while Mr Rocca had favoured a production warrant, he had left the matter to the RGP as it was an operational decision.

Sir Peter found too that there was no evidence showing Mr McGrail had lied to the Chief Minister during the May 12 stand-off in No.6 Convent place, even if Mr Picardo was convinced that had been the case.

“I accept that what [Mr McGrail] said might have been unintentionally misleading but I am quite satisfied that he did not deliberately give an untrue version,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“He did not lie.”

“However, I also accept that Mr Picardo genuinely believed – and still believes – that Mr McGrail told him that the DPP had advised the RGP to apply for the search warrant and that he genuinely concluded that it was a deliberate lie, but that he had misunderstood what Mr McGrail had said.”

Sir Peter said that “misunderstanding” had the “most regrettable consequences” and contributed to Mr Picardo’s decision that Mr McGrail had to go.

He agreed with Mr McGrail’s “entirely appropriate” description of having been “berated” in the May 12 meeting.

He said Chief Minister has no legal standing in, “still less statutory responsibility for”, criminal investigations or prosecutions.

“Mr Levy was the senior partner in Hassans, a firm in which Mr Picardo remained a partner,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“The warrant had been granted by a Magistrate, who had considered the 38-page information, whereas Mr Picardo then knew nothing of the evidence against Mr Levy.”

“Furthermore, as he well knew, the whole police investigation was directed at attempts that had been made by 36 North to obtain the transfer of the NSCIS contract from Bland – attempts of which Mr Picardo had been kept informed by the participants…”

“36 North was a company in which he indirectly held a small interest, a company in which Mr Levy had a larger interest, and a company of which Hassans owned fully one third.”

Sir Peter accepted that the Chief Minister was entitled to be “critical, even highly critical” of the RGP, “even of their operational decisions”, adding “that is part of the democratic process”.

“However, there is a point when criticism risks becoming interference; that point is easier to recognise than to define,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“In my opinion, this is the first point at which Mr Picardo plainly crossed that line.”

“I reject Mr Picardo’s defence of his actions.”

“I do not think that he was protecting the reputation of Gibraltar; I think it far more likely that he was moving to protect Mr Levy, his life-time friend and ‘mentor’, from the likely consequences of the warrant being executed or his phones being interrogated.”

Reflecting the arguments of Mr McGrail’s lawyers, Sir Peter said he accepted that “to equate the personal interests of a small circle of rich, powerful and influential individuals in Gibraltar, many of whom are professional colleagues (or former professional colleagues), and even friends, with the interests of Gibraltar itself, may tend to encourage or to conceal misconduct or inappropriate and improper interference in official business or public affairs.”

“Otherwise, any action taken to protect those individuals, or their interests, could then be justified as protecting ‘the jurisdiction’.”

“This cannot be right, because then the ends will always justify the means, and those individuals and their interests will always be protected.”

“I find that the meeting on 12 May was a grossly improper attempt to interfere in a legitimate police investigation and operation.”

“That Mr Picardo still seeks to defend his actions, that he thinks that he was within his rights, is not mitigation. Indeed, it makes it much worse.”

Even so, Sir Peter noted there had been no actual interference with the police operation on May 12.

“I conclude that, however improper it was to summon Mr McGrail, and however improper it was to ‘berate’ him, neither action in fact interfered with the visit of the RGP to Hassans; they carried on precisely as had been planned,” he said.

“I conclude that there was no actual interference with the RGP’s actions on 12 May.”

The meeting on May 12 set in motion a series of events that culminated in the early retirement of Mr McGrail in early June that year.

SEARCH WARRANT AFTERMATH

In the report, Sir Peter considered evidence of exchanges and contact between Mr Picardo, Mr Levy and his lawyer, Hassans partner Lewis Baglietto, in the days after May 12.

He noted that Mr Picardo believed he had been told by the Attorney General, wrongly as it transpired, that the DPP had advised against a search warrant and shared this information with Mr Levy.

“To tell Mr Levy what he had been told by the Attorney General about this advice given by the DPP was a grossly improper disclosure of confidential material, which he must have known, and intended, might assist his defence to the detriment of the prosecution (although I make clear that this does not amount to a finding of civil or criminal liability),” Sir Peter said in the report.

“That the advice given was completely misquoted is not an excuse or justification.”

“Having come into possession of confidential information in his role as Chief Minister, it is plainly not appropriate for Mr Picardo to tell the suspect, or his lawyer, what he believed the DPP had advised for or against, or indeed that he had not so advised.”

The Chief Minister had also sent messages to Mr Baglietto on how a police officer might legally be removed and how mobile phones might be retrieved, both of which Sir Peter also classed as “grossly improper” attempts at interference with the investigation.

In both cases, Sir Peter made no criticism of Mr Baglietto, who received the messages.

Sir Peter was also critical of a meeting between the Chief Minister, Mr Levy and Mr Baglietto in the days after May 12.

That meeting had not been disclosed by Mr Picardo until his third affidavit to the Inquiry, something Sir Peter concluded had been deliberate “because he knew others would find it to be deeply inappropriate”.

“I comment that, here, we have Mr Picardo, as Chief Minister, meeting a person then suspected of serious crime, arising from the misuse of the NSCIS platform, intended to protect the security of Gibraltar, with the lawyer acting for him, at his home, without any record or minute of the meeting,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“It is no excuse that all three were old friends; indeed, it makes it rather worse, since that is a further reason why they should not have been discussing this matter at all.”

“This was a grossly improper meeting, which should never have taken place.”

And he later added: “If Mr Picardo was aware of the boundaries, which I doubt, he had yet again chosen to break them.”

Sir Peter acknowledged local culture and practice within Gibraltar’s small, closely-knit community.

“Where everyone may meet anyone in the street on an almost daily basis, there is naturally a much more informal relationship between ministers and citizens,” he said in the report.

“In one sense, such informality encourages and celebrates social cohesion, and can serve to promote and foster the efficient conduct of business.”

“But – as it seems to me – there is a risk that such contacts, which are not minuted or recorded, can give rise to the inappropriate communications of confidential information, to the granting of inappropriate favours, and to the creation of inappropriate reciprocal obligations.”

“There is also a serious risk that in such informal meetings, conflicts of interest are not properly identified and are therefore not only not avoided but unconsciously promoted.”

“Official business is best conducted through official channels, noted at the time, or at least recorded or confirmed by contemporaneous messages exchanged immediately afterwards.”

“Private meetings of public and influential figures, particularly when old friends and business partners, discussing public affairs, without any proper note, lack transparency and are bound – at the very least – to give rise to the suggestion or appearance of impropriety.”

“If, as I think is suggested – or at least implied – on behalf of Hassans, the local ‘culture and practice’ in Gibraltar has been for a ‘small pool of political, legal and business actors’ to conduct public business at such informal meetings, in private, without note or record, then I think that the culture and practice should change.”

“It is out of step with modern standards of accountability and transparency, of which Gibraltar, as a progressive and prosperous democracy, should be an exemplar.”

Sir Peter said both Mr Levy and Mr Baglietto should have been aware to the danger that such a meeting would “likely bear the appearance of old friends, at the very heart of power and influence in Gibraltar, seeking to affect the course of a police investigation so as to protect Mr Levy from the consequences of a warrant issued by the courts.”

Sir Peter also noted that the Chief Minister had sent a message to Mr Llamas alerting him to a section of the Constitution that possibly gave the Attorney General powers to discontinue the search warrant.

Sir Peter made no finding as to whether the constitutional point was correct but added “…to my mind this is another grossly improper attempt by Mr Picardo to interfere in an active criminal investigation by the RGP, to protect his friend and mentor, Mr Levy.”

AG’S ROLE

In the report, Sir Peter rejected allegations from Mr McGrail that Attorney General Michael Llamas, who was present at the May 12 meeting, had earlier sought to interfere with the investigation during meetings in the months prior to the search warrant.

“I simply do not accept that Mr Llamas tried to interfere with the investigation before the search warrant was granted, let alone that he did so improperly, as Mr McGrail has alleged,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“I do not think that Mr McGrail was lying; I think that in the light of what happened later, he has persuaded himself that these exchanges took place.”

He found too that, while Mr Llamas believed there was an agreement with the RGP that no major step would be taken in the Operation Delhi investigation without prior discussion either with him or the DPP, there was in fact no such arrangement.

“I simply do not accept that Mr McGrail gave such an undertaking as Mr Llamas asserts; indeed, I am sure he did not,” Sir Peter said.

“Mr Llamas may have thought that it was clear from what was said that the RGP would not take any further action without further consulting with him, but I think it was far from clear; he is either mistaken in his recollection or has simply misunderstood or misinterpreted what was said.”

Sir Peter also considered contacts between Mr Llamas and the RGP investigators in the days after May 12, and with Mr Baglietto.

“I think that Mr Llamas was justified in trying to broker an agreement between the RGP and Mr Baglietto as to the way forward, particularly since both understood that that was precisely what he was trying to do,” Sir Peter said.

“Mr Llamas and Mr Rocca thought that the RGP should have proceeded by way of a production order rather than by way of a search warrant; that was a perfectly reasonable view to take, and they were entitled to express it.”

“The fact is that the RGP agreed to these proposals, which they were free to reject, if they chose to do so.”

“If, having considered Mr Levy’s written statement, there remained reasonable grounds still to suspect him, then they could still have arrested him and interviewed him under caution.”

“The arrangement reached to avoid these perceived ‘crises’ may have been unprecedented, but it was not unlawful.”

“It is said that the RGP were persuaded not to take these steps by Mr Llamas, or even that the RGP officers were, in effect, outmanoeuvred by Mr Llamas.”

“But Mr Llamas’ skilled diplomacy in brokering an arrangement, which the RGP themselves voluntarily accepted, cannot in my opinion amount to an interference with the investigation, and it did not do so.”

COLLISION AT SEA

Mr McGrail said he had been “muscled out” because of the search warrant and Operation Delhi, but the Government parties insisted this was just one of many cumulative factors that led to Mr Picardo and Mr Pyle losing confidence in the former Commissioner.

Mr Pyle and Mr Picardo called on the Gibraltar Police Authority [GPA] to request Mr McGrail to take early retirement or face the then interim Governor exercising powers allowing him to force the Commissioner to resign.

But the GPA process, in which Sir Peter found Mr Picardo had also played an inappropriate role, was flawed and the request for retirement was ultimately withdrawn.

By then though, Mr Pyle had indicated he was ready to use his powers to ask for Mr McGrail’s resignation.

The Commissioner, faced with that situation and the heavy toll it was taking on his mental health, chose to take early retirement to protect his position.

In the report, Sir Peter rejected claims that Mr Pyle had been “manipulated” by the Chief Minister.

He found the interim Governor had valid reasons to have lost faith in Mr McGrail, particularly over matters relating to an incident at sea on March 8, 2020, in which two Spanish men died following a collision with an RGP vessel during a high-speed chase in Spanish waters.

Mr Pyle believed Mr McGrail had not provided timely information to him on the location of the collision despite its grave repercussions, including on the international stage at a time of delicate negotiations with Spain over Gibraltar’s post-Brexit future.

“I am satisfied – indeed I am sure – that Mr McGrail did not give the best available information to Mr Pyle on 8 and 9 March and he did not do so until 11 March,” Sir Peter said in the report.

Sir Peter could not say why this was the case but added he was unable to find Mr McGrail had been “dishonest or sought deliberately to mislead the interim Governor”.

But he was clear that the omission had “seriously damaged the trust and confidence” that Mr Pyle had in Mr McGrail as Commissioner of Police.

That, combined with other factors including Mr McGrail’s response to a “shockingly bad” report on the RGP by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary [HMIC], as it then was, meant Mr Pyle’s conclusion that the force needed new leadership was “a sincerely held view”.

“I am prepared to go further; I think that it was an entirely reasonable conclusion to reach in the circumstances of the incident at sea and the HMIC report,” Sir Peter said in the report.

Sir Peter nonetheless considered that the process to achieve that change of leadership “had some serious defects”.

FLAWED GPA PROCESS

Mr Pyle and Mr Picardo informed the then GPA chairman, Dr Joey Britto, of their loss of confidence in Mr McGrail at a meeting in The Convent on May 18, 2020.

But Sir Peter found that the Chief Minister “quite deliberately” told Dr Britto very little about his real complaint.

“According to Mr Picardo, the alleged lie told by Mr McGrail was the main reason for his loss of confidence in him, yet in his informal record he spent five pages detailing his other – subsidiary – complaints, whilst devoting only a few vague and unspecific lines to being ‘misled’,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“I do not accept his explanation for not spelling out his real grievance in the note.”

“I am bound to conclude that he did not do so because he knew that if he had set out in detail the lie which he alleged had been told to him, it would – or certainly should – have prompted a series of questions about his links to Mr Levy, to Hassans, and to 36 North and this may have exposed his lack of independence.”

“By suppressing the truth, he was in effect suggesting a falsehood; he was in the process seeking to mislead Dr Britto and the GPA as to the reasons for his loss of confidence in Mr McGrail.”

Sir Peter found that the process of communicating the reasons for the loss of trust to Mr McGrail, and its implications for his career, was procedurally flawed and unfair because he was not properly informed as to the detailed reasons for the loss of trust or given a chance to respond.

The GPA had focused its decision primarily on the incident at sea and did not probe in any detail other matters including those arising from Operation Delhi, in part because these had not been spelt out in detail to Dr Britto.

The GPA members gave great weight to the fact that both the interim Governor and the Chief Minister had said they had lost confidence in Mr McGrail, concluding this made the Commissioner’s position untenable.

Sir Peter noted evidence from GPA members that, had they been aware about the detail of Operation Delhi and Mr Picardo’s connection to it, they would likely have sought legal advice.

He concluded that Mr Picardo “quite deliberately and cynically did not spell out that his real grievance arose from the issue of the warrant against Mr Levy, including the alleged lie, and led the GPA to focus on a loss of confidence arising from the concerns of Mr Pyle about the incident at sea and, to a lesser extent, the HMIC report.”

“In this respect I have no doubt that Mr Picardo deliberately underplayed his real grievance and thereby misled Dr Britto and the GPA,” he said in the report.

Sir Peter said the GPA “could – and should – have asked searching questions” about all of these matters but did not do so.

“The fact is that – at least initially – they did as they were told to do,” he said in the report.

The GPA invited Mr McGrail to retire without first inviting representations from him in his defence, “a procedural blunder from which there was no return”.

“Such an approach is, to my mind, plainly unlawful, as they later realised themselves,” Sir Peter added.

Dr Britto sought advice in this process from the Chief Minister, something that was “entirely inappropriate” albeit “it did not strike him as such” at the time.

“On the other hand, Mr Picardo most certainly should have realised that this compromised – or at least was likely to have the appearance of having compromised – the independence of the GPA,” Sir Peter said.

The letter from Dr Britto to Mr McGrail was heavily edited by Mr Picardo, which Sir Peter said brought into question the GPA’s independence in the matter.

It only referred expressly to the incident at sea and the HMIC report and did not name Mr Levy, the search warrant or the alleged lie that Mr Picardo believed Mr McGrail told.

“In my judgement, if, as Mr Picardo maintains, the dominant reason for his loss of confidence was the issues arising from Operation Delhi, including the alleged lie, I consider it to be remarkable and indeed sinister that the letter does not name Mr Levy or refer to the grant of the search warrant, the visit to Hassans, or to ‘the lie’ which Mr Picardo alleges that McGrail told,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“The letter was intended to set out, in detail, the reasons for asking the Commissioner of Police to retire, and yet it does not do so.”

“In my opinion, an oblique and cryptic reference – or an ‘allusion’ as he claimed it to be – to the views of the Attorney General is not sufficient to explain to Mr McGrail, or to anyone else reading, the real reason for his loss of confidence.”

“When asked, Mr Picardo denied that he was being ‘coy’ about 12 May in the letter.”

“But in my opinion, being ‘coy’ about the events of 12 May does not catch the significance of the omission.”

“Those acting for Mr McGrail argue that these absent reasons do not appear in the letter, which was largely drafted by Mr Picardo himself, because he knew that his intervention in respect of the warrant was improper and sought to exclude it from the written record.”

“I accept this submission.”

“The inevitable and irresistible conclusion is that Mr Picardo was using the processes of the GPA to bring about Mr McGrail’s effective dismissal for reasons of his own, relating to the police investigation into Mr Levy, whilst managing the process so as to give the appearance that he was being asked to retire for other reasons, namely the incident at sea and the HMIC report.”

He later added: “I accept that the incident at sea and the matters arising from the HMIC report could have given rise to substantial complaints against Mr McGrail’s leadership of the RGP, but that is not how matters proceeded and was something which was not properly formulated against Mr McGrail, and of which he was given no proper notice.”

“In my opinion, the process by which Mr Picardo and Mr Pyle raised their complaints against Mr McGrail was unfair because they provided no proper particulars of what was alleged against him and such particulars, as he was eventually given by the GPA, omitted entirely Mr Picardo’s real grievance.”

NO MANIPULATION

The GPA’s invitation to retire was challenged by lawyers for McGrail and prompted the GPA to seek legal advice and later recognise that its approach had been procedurally flawed. The letter was withdrawn.

Sir Peter recognised that the GPA “readily and unreservedly” acknowledged serious mistakes, accepting too that Dr Britto and that the GPA members “acted in good faith, without malice or hostility” towards Mr McGrail.

But he added that there had been serious mistakes by the GPA “for which it cannot escape criticism”, albeit these arose in large part because of a lack of staff, training or experience and expertise to challenge what they were told.

“I consider the serious failings of the GPA to be more organisational and systemic rather than personal,” Sir Peter said.

Withdrawal of the GPA letter inviting Mr McGrail to retire prompted the interim Governor to consider using his powers to require Mr McGrail to step down from his post.

“I accept that Mr Pyle’s decision to consider exercising his power under the section 13 of the Police Act was entirely his own,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“There is no evidence that he was put under any pressure by anyone else and in particular by Mr Picardo.”

“But, having said that, the initiation of the process had been encouraged by Mr Picardo, who had his own agenda, as I have explained.”

Mr Pyle set out his position in a letter to the GPA after Mr McGrail’s lawyers challenged the invitation to retire.

In that letter, he “strongly asserted” that his loss of confidence in the Commissioner had nothing to do with the RGP’s handling of what he described as the “so-called ongoing criminal investigation” – a reference to the search warrant and Operation Delhi – but arose instead from the incident at sea, on which he believed Mr McGrail had been evasive on key issues including its location, and the HMIC report.

He said the two incidents came on the back of growing unease over several months.

“I accept without reservation that Mr Pyle knew nothing of Operation Delhi, or the investigation of Mr Levy, or the search warrant, until he was told about it by Mr Picardo on 15 May,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“Indeed, he says that he did not even know the operational name for ‘quite some time’.”

“It could not be argued that Mr Pyle had sought to interfere in an investigation about which he knew nothing at the material time.”

Sir Peter noted too that Mr Pyle had made “frequent, detailed and accurate reports” to the FCDO, including on the proposal to require Mr McGrail to resign.

“I think the content of these reports does rebut suggestions that Mr Pyle either allowed himself to be manipulated by Mr Picardo, or that there was an improper or corrupt conspiracy between them, or that he was seeking to rush the process through before the new Governor arrived, let alone for any improper or surreptitious reason.”

“I have made the point that I consider that the process under section 13 which Mr Pyle was contemplating to be unfair because it did not give Mr McGrail proper particulars of the complaints made against him.”

“This was merely a procedural error made in good faith, and does not render Mr Pyle’s conduct ‘improper’.”

“Mr Pyle gave honest and entirely candid evidence.”

“He has had a distinguished career of public service, in Gibraltar and elsewhere.”

“He is, I think, entitled to a more trenchant exoneration than my simply saying that there is no evidence that he acted improperly or corruptly.”

“I roundly reject both suggestions.”

“He has behaved honourably throughout.”

While Mr Pyle took legal advice from both the Attorney General and FCDO lawyers on his powers to require the resignation of Mr McGrail, Sir Peter noted that the Attorney General had taken no part in the decision by the interim Governor and the Chief Minister that they had lost confidence in Mr McGrail.

“I reject entirely the suggestion that he [the Attorney General] was in some way involved in a corrupt conspiracy to remove Mr McGrail from office,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“I cannot put it plainer than that.”

“He only became involved at all at this later stage, because Mr Pyle asked him to advise whether the GPA were in ‘default’ and, if so, whether Mr Pyle should consider proceeding by way of section 13(1)(f).”

A question was raised as to whether Mr Pyle, who was interim Governor pending the imminent arrival of Sir David Steel to take up the post, had the powers to require Mr McGrail to leave the post if it came to that.

Sir Peter found that he did and that Mr Pyle, as interim Governor, “had all the Constitutional and statutory powers to act as Governor” until Sir David took office on June 11.

On claims that Mr Pyle was “improperly rushing” the decision, Sir Peter acknowledged that Sir David would have “dealt with the issue” and might have brought fresh perspective to the situation.

But he acknowledged too that Mr Pyle had “a valid point” in saying he was “anxious to complete the process” before the new Governor arrived and avoid risking going back to square one.

“Either course would have been reasonable, and I do not criticise Mr Pyle for taking the position that he did,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“He was not rushing to judgement.”

‘UNSURPRISING’ DECISION TO RETIRE

Sir Peter said it was only perhaps as late as June 5 that Mr McGrail reached “a firm and settled intention” to retire, and that prior to that he “sincerely, but perhaps increasingly unrealistically, hoped that something might turn up”.

Weighing on the former Commissioner’s mind was the dilemma of whether to “stand and fight” against what he considered “a grossly unfair, unlawful and unconstitutional” attempt to force him out for improper reasons that could impact him and Gibraltar’s reputation, or whether to “accept the inevitable” and go quietly with some dignity and without causing a constitutional crisis.

“I do not think it in the least surprising that he chose the latter course,” Sir Peter said in the report.

Sir Peter concluded that Mr McGrail retired as a result of cumulative factors, including that he knew Mr Picardo and Mr Pyle were claiming they had lost confidence in him and his position had therefore become “untenable”.

Mr McGrail retired “only because he felt he was being unfairly and unlawfully compelled to do so”.

Another factor was that the former Commissioner felt he was under “improper pressure” from Mr Picardo to alter the course of a live criminal investigation.

Mr McGrail’s decision was influenced too by “procedural unfairness” as Mr Pyle contemplated using powers to ask him to step down without giving him proper details of the complaint against him.

His deteriorating mental health and the prospect of humiliation if he was forced to retire following an unfair process were also factors contributing to his decision.

Finally, Mr McGrail believed, probably mistakenly, that he might lose his pension rights if he did not retire before being compelled to do so, the report also noted.

Lawyers for Mr McGrail had submitted that the Inquiry chairmen should recommend redress in the form of an apology to Mr McGrail and compensation.

But while Sir Peter found that the process leading to Mr McGrail’s retirement was “procedurally defective”, it was not within his terms of reference to say whether that might have provided him with some legal redress.

“Furthermore, I have also accepted that these procedural irregularities might have been cured by giving proper particulars [to Mr McGrail about the complaint against him], and that if they had been given, then a Governor might have had grounds to exercise his powers under section 13(1)(f) to require his retirement,” Sir Peter said in the report.

“It is not within my terms of reference to speculate what might have happened if proper particulars had been given, and I have declined to do so.”

“For these reasons, I specifically decline to recommend any form of redress, whether by way of apology or compensation.”