The Spy in the Bag Murder

This story has always for some odd reason, reminded me of the news when it first broke about the NSA. I remember this lovely man I was dating at the time and I laughing so hard about the world-wide reaction to that news.

Did anyone really think that our own Government in the US didn’t possess the technology to listen into/record our calls obtain our cell phone data/records, read our emails. I mean, come on, hackers do it, hell even one’s employer has been doing it since the 90’s. While all those individuals possessed the capability to do it we just somehow figured that our Government was not just as capable….or doing it?

Then the paranoia, Facebook flooded with disclaimers in the vain hope the NSA would take heed…ha, ha, ha. Who reading this really thought the NSA was going through Your crap?

Equally, other countries reactions were hilarious, they could not fathom that the NSA was recording calls or viewing emails they had produced. I mean we are allies right? Did everyone somehow miss the memo/class on spying on one’s allies or foes? Although it’s not spoken out loud often, everyone knows that all nations/countries spy on one another and go to great lengths to do so in an effort to obtain information, counterintelligence…that’s really a huge reason intelligence agencies and units exist.

Mr. Gareth Williams ~ Born, September 26, 1978 ~ Died August 16, 2010

Gareth was a very gifted mathematician and expert cryptographer who happened to work for GCHQ, Government Communications Headquarters which is part of SIS or MI6 if you will. His death has been shrouded in mystery since the day his body was discovered.

Initially an inquest found his death “Unnatural” and thus ruled his demise as “Criminally Mediated.” However, a second inquest was performed which ruled his death as “Accidental.” It’s at this precise point the case starts to take some pretty bizarre turns depending on whose version of what you listen to or read about that you’d like to believe.

Gareth was found on August 23rd, 2010 although the best guess was that he died on August 16th, 2010. Police did a welfare check because co-workers suddenly missed him, after 7 days of him being absent from work/life, they reported him missing. Ok, I don’t know about any of you, but I can’t even use the restroom for 1 minute without my boss or a coworker hunting me down, 7 days?

His decomposing naked remains were found inside the North Face bag, padlocked from the outside, in the bath of the main bedroom’s en-suite bathroom. The police had gained entry into his top floor flat in Alderney Street, Pimlico at around 4:40pm.

Vincent Williams from the Metropolitan Police informed the Westminster Coroner’s Court that experts were agreed that it was impossible for Gareth Williams to have locked himself in. Williams’s date of death was estimated to have been in the early hours of August 16, one week before he was found.

Gareth had recently qualified for operational deployment, and had worked with US National Security Agency and FBI agents. The US State Department asked that no details of Gareth’s work should emerge at the inquest. It should be noted here that shortly after the investigation started the heads of the Secret Intelligence Service and Metropolitan Police met to discuss how the police would handle the investigation in light of the top secret nature of Gareth’s work, and who would lead the investigation.

After launching an investigation, the coroner Dr. Fiona Wilcox said that there were no injuries on his body and no signs that he had been involved in a struggle. She also stated that his body was also free of alcohol and common recreational drugs. The Metropolitan Police considered his death “suspicious and unexplained”. The FBI has also conducted their own investigation into the case.

Now for the ludicrous, In December of 2010, police released details that stated Gareth had visited a number of bondage websites. Yet at the later inquest, it was stated these visits were “sporadic and isolated.” It was stated that they accounted for only a small proportion of the time he spent online. Last but not least, at the inquest it was noted that he never visited any website devoted to claustrophilia – a sexual interest in being confined in small spaces. That’s a new one one me…but hey whatever rocks one’s world right?

An expert who was brought in to examine the bag in which Gareth’s body was found, concluded Gareth could not have locked it.

The police also released a photo of two people they were seeking, who were seen to enter the communal entrance of his home in June or July 2010 but later dismissed them as person’s of interest.

Here are some other interesting tidbits to chew on:

Another inquest was held in March of 2012 where another coroner Anthony O’Toole stated that either a second individual was present when Gareth died or broke in after the fact without the benefit of having any evidence to prove that, none, not a shred.

The door and locks had been removed from the scene before investigators and experts became involved

2 additional experts, were unable to lock themselves in a similar bag despite having made something like 400 attempts to do so

Pathologist, Richard Shepard said that it was likely Gareth were alive prior to being put into the bag as it would have been too difficult to do so had he been dead

While another Pathologist said that Gareth would have been overcome by Hypercapnia, elevated carbon dioxide levels after only two or three minutes in the bag. I am guessing that guy didn’t know the bags are made of breathable materials but that’s just me…

Gareth’s family firmly believes that the secret service agency is responsible

Gareth’s former landlady initially reported to local media about him being a great tenant and quiet. After local news reports began to surface suggesting he was into some bizarre sexual stuff she had to have her two seconds of fame and recanted that whole great tenant bit and reported that she and her lovely husband had been awakened from a nice slumber, by Gareth screaming for help. According to her, he had managed to tie himself to the bed and needed help getting free. I have to admit even that is rather far fetched unless he had cuffs. My last long term partner tried that one night and couldn’t manage it himself and I had to help tie him to the bed

£20,000 worth of women’s clothing was found in Gareth’s flat

Journalist Duncan Campbell reported that the inquest evidence indicated that Gareth was on a team of intelligence officers sent to penetrate US and UK hacking networks. He had attended the 2010 Black Hat Briefings and DEF CON conferences. He had started with SIS in London in spring 2009, and after taking a number of training courses started on “active operational work”.A few months before his death, he asked to return to GCHQ as he disliked the “rat race, flash car competitions and post-work drinking culture” at SIS and as a keen cyclist and walker wanted to go back to the countryside, and was due to return in September

In August 2015 the Daily Mail reported that prior to his death Gareth had been conducting financial surveillance on illicit cash flows out of Russia some reports state it was for the US. it was also stated that there had been a surreptitious entry into his flat in the days immediately following discovery of his body, presumably for the purpose of removing incriminating evidence

Yet another report indicates that he gave a secret list of attendee’s to a dinner party the Clinton’s were attending to a friend which angered his bosses back at SIS, hardly a reason to kill a man over

Then in In September and October 2015, Boris Karpichkov, a former KGB agent who defected from Russia and who now lives in Britain, stated during interviews that “sources in Russia” have claimed that the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, also known as the SVR, was responsible for Gareth’s murder. According to Karpichkov, the SVR tried and failed to blackmail Gareth into becoming a double agent. Allow me to take a moment and laugh at this one

Boris also went on to say that in response to the SVR’s attempts, Gareth apparently claimed that he knew “the identity of a Russian spy inside the GCHQ.” Karpichkov claimed that Gareth’s threat meant that “the SVR then had no alternative but to exterminate him in order to protect their agent inside GCHQ.” Regarding the cause of death, Karpichkov claimed that the SVR killed Gareth”by an untraceable poison introduced in his ear

The coroner was critical of SIS for failing to report Williams missing for 7 days, which caused extra anguish and suffering for his family, and led to the loss of forensic evidence

The coroner was highly critical of the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command (SO15), who failed to tell the senior investigating officer before the inquest began of the existence of nine memory sticks and other property in Williams’s SIS office. SO15 failed to take formal statements when interviewing SIS officers. The coroner said the possible involvement of SIS staff in the death was a legitimate line of inquiry for the police

So many great stories surround Gareth as the list just goes on and on and get’s more entertaining each time I see something pop up.

I have to touch on Boris Karpichkov. His story by the way is not the first time someone a former KGB agent or some other type of defector from Russia has come out to the MEDIA and stated it was the Russians.

Gareth was not an overly friendly guy, in fact according to acquaintances, even in early childhood Gareth was not ever quite capable developing close personal relationships. He is what I often refer to as someone who is dead inside, where close personal relationships are not needed, they aren’t even wanted by individuals such as Gareth. They simply bare no meaning to him. He was also as we know a rather gifted mathematician, really good numbers people don’t tend to be people, people.

That in and of itself should tell anyone who is smarter than a rock that you’d have to be a total idiot to try to approach him and force him to be a double agent. Additionally, former KGB or not, any agent worth his weight in salt does not kiss and tell the MEDIA.

Gareth either died at the hands of some twisted sexual encounter that his former employer feels should be kept private for obvious reasons or he was killed by someone that worked for intelligence, what agency depends on what he knew exactly. It’s likely that he could have stumbled across something that he shouldn’t have, he could have been asked to collect evidence about one of his own within the ranks, it’s doubtful he was approached to be a double agent. Gareth did not make friends easily. Whatever he had been working on could have put him in danger, or he might have been stealing intel….the list goes on and on.

Hands down it was work related, his former employer knows what happened or near what happened.

That said…

Gareth Williams was an officer for his country’s Intelligence agency. He knew the risks involved with working for such an employer, he also knew that he could meet with an untimely and unnatural death due to his line of work.

That doesn’t ever equal that the rest of us are entitled to or have a right to know how, why, what, where or when. We don’t have a right to know who killed him or why and sadly neither does his family. It’s important to remember a lot is involved in becoming an employee for any intelligence agency in the world, no matter what Government or nation. You don’t tell your loved one’s what you are up to, you don’t share it with your friends and your sudden demise may be shrouded in secrecy as well, should it in fact happen. It’s an understanding.

Working for an intelligence agency anywhere in the world means that you could die at any moment for just knowing about a secret. It also means that investigative details obtained may never be released, the killer will not stand trial and the family may never know the truth. Unless it’s on such a level that someone put an entire nation at risk by whatever they did, intelligence agencies generally handle these things very internally and those details never see the light of day.

We as a public are demanding answers to something we have no right know. All of our Governments keep a great many secrets from us, while we don’t always like that or agree with it, it is what it is. We are not privy to a host of information, nor should we be.

I know many of you might be thinking I am an ass for saying that and I might agree with you. What it all really means is that Gareth Williams did in fact die due to his job and we should leave it be at that. It’s not any of our business how or why he died. What’s most important is that we should stop putting credit into stories of odd and bizarre sexual behavior or any so called former KGB, spy or otherwise going to the media with some story. His former employer isn’t going to give much credit to those stories, that doesn’t mean we should keep speculating until his former employer answers. Intelligence agency????

Every time the media opens the door with another story and we run through it, it opens a wound for his family. Let the man be remembered for his service to his country not how he was found dead or how it was that he died. Gareth strikes me as the type who took his work seriously, he took keeping some of the most sensitive secrets he was privy to, to heart, he would not want us speculating over his death, he’d want us to accept it and move on so that his family can heal.

Cristal M Clark