The Royal Inquiry continues

Princes want quick Diana inquest
By Phil Hazlewood in London
January 09, 2007 08:17am
THE two sons of Princess Diana today called for the inquest into their mother's death to be "open, fair and transparent" as well as fast, as the long-awaited hearing was being prepared in a London court.
"The princes have asked me to indicate that it is their desire that the inquest should not only be open, fair and transparent but that it should move swiftly to a conclusion,'' an aide to princes William and Harry said in a letter.
The letter, from the young royals' private secretary Major Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, was read out by coroner Elizabeth Butler-Sloss as preliminary hearings started at London's Royal Courts of Justice.
Maj Lowther-Pinkerton is representing the princes at the hearing. Baroness Butler-Sloss said it was unlikely the pair - both now British army officers - would be required as witnesses.
Diana's sister, Lady Sarah McCorquodale, also wrote to the inquest, saying she, her brother Earl Charles Spencer and her sister Lady Jane Fellowes shared the princes' view.
On a day dominated by legal formalities, Baroness Butler-Sloss indicated she wanted a joint inquest into the deaths of Diana and her boyfriend at the time of the 1997 Paris car crash, Dodi Fayed, and a jury of ordinary members of the public.
She also indicated that she would like the inquest proper to start no later than the beginning of May.
The preliminary hearing, scheduled for two days, came just weeks after a British police probe into conspiracy theories surrounding the princess's death concluded the crash was a "tragic accident".
The inquest - a legal requirement when a British citizen dies an unnatural death abroad and the body is repatriated - has a narrow remit, determining only the identity of the deceased, plus how, when and where they died.
No blame is determined at inquests and the verdict must not identify anyone as having criminal or civil liability.
Possible verdicts include natural causes, accident, suicide, unlawful or lawful killing or industrial disease. The inquest may also produce an open verdict if there is insufficient evidence to reach a conclusion.
Baroness Butler-Sloss - a retired former senior High Court judge with a no-nonsense reputation -- said that to hold two separate inquests would be "unbelievably expensive'' and cause upset to both families.
She also said it was her "preliminary view'' that any jury that may hear the case should not be made up entirely of members of the royal household as specified in an archaic constitutional law.
"I think that's one decision I can make today. I think it entirely inappropriate for me to ask for a jury from the royal household,'' she said.
Lawyers for Dodi Fayed's father, the millionaire owner of Harrod's department store Mohammed Al Fayed, have pushed for joint inquests and want any jury to be made up of ordinary members of the public.
The hearing involves lawyers not just for Diana and Dodi Fayed, but also for the Queen, Mohammed Fayed and his Paris Ritz Hotel, which employed the couple's chauffeur that night, Frenchman Henri Paul.
Trevor Rees-Jones, Diana's bodyguard who was the sole survivor of the crash, will also have a lawyer present.
Good on you boys!