Lesley Roberts spoke to Police Scotland officers on two separate occasions last month. The first, on December 4, saw detectives visit her at home to take a statement about the biggest homicide investigation in Scottish legal history.
She is a crucial witness to the probe, known as Operation Koper, which is looking into alleged criminality in the tidal wave of potentially avoidable deaths that occurred in care homes and hospitals during the Covid pandemic.
Many people have strong views on how the virus was handled by the Scottish and UK governments, but few have taken such bold action as Lesley. In March 2023, she reported Nicola Sturgeon and Jeane Freeman to the police in Glasgow for ‘corporate manslaughter’.
Some dismissed the report (made together with fellow campaigners Rab Wilson and Roger Livermore) as a gimmick or a stunt, but it speaks volumes that the former nurse is still supplying evidence and information to Police Scotland and the Crown Office more than 18 months later.
READ MORE: Whistleblowing nurse on why she is determined to hold Nicola Sturgeon to account for Covid deaths
READ MORE: Nicola Sturgeon Covid probe could be the ‘biggest corporate homicide in legal history’
Which brings us to the second time she spoke to the police last month, when she had to report another death threat that had been made against her – apparently as a result of her crusade for justice at the expense of current and former members of the Scottish Government.
Speaking to the Scottish Daily Express, Lesley says: “I’m still receiving lots of abuse and a lot of threats but it’s not going to stop me. I’ve been the subject of an ongoing STORM order for the past three years now.”
STORM stands for ‘System for Tasking and Operational Resource Management’, Police Scotland’s national command and control system, which plays a key role in managing hate crime reports.
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Lesley adds: “I’ve had people shouting at me in the street, accusing me of being out to get Nicola Sturgeon. I even got told I was going to be a ‘casualty of the war for independence’. No kidding. I was down at the waterfront at Greenock and he threatened to throw me in the water.
“I’ve had tomatoes thrown at me in Tesco’s, I’ve had all sorts. I’ve even had my car set on fire and these days I always check my car before I drive anywhere.”
The firebombing happened in August 2022, before her report to the police but after she had started questioning the Scottish Government. However, the attack may have been linked to one of her other campaigns relating to allegations of toxic waste left behind at a former NHS site.
Lesley Roberts outside Inverclyde Royal Hospital
(Image: Tony Nicoletti)
These days, Lesley is fully focused on winning justice for Covid victims (behind the scenes, she helps many survivors and grieving families as they attempt to tackle the bureaucracy and red tape that snares anyone hoping to take on the public sector).
Remarkably, she has been told by well-informed sources that Operation Koper could continue for another five years. The investigation was launched in May 2020, just a few weeks after the start of the pandemic.
Officers are examining more than 6,000 Covid care home deaths across nearly 500 care homes, and it is understood that a number of hospital deaths are also included. It is the Crown’s biggest investigation of deaths in Scottish history, many times larger than the probe into Piper Alpha disaster which saw 167 oil and gas industry workers killed in the world’s worst offshore disaster in 1988.
Nicola Sturgeon and Jeane Freeman (inset)
Says Lesley: “This was my fourth statement. The first one was a general statement about my allegations, the second one related specifically to the deleted WhatsApp messages by Scottish Government ministers and officials, the third one was more background information and this latest one included finer details about issues like face masks and health and safety law.”
This is a subject she knows inside out, having worked as an infection control nurse and a health and safety representative for Unite the Union in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, the UK’s largest health board. However, she admits she is frustrated at the slow pace of the inquiry.
“It could be another five years before it finally comes to a conclusion,” she sighs. “I understand why, given the magnitude of what’s involved here, I don’t think anybody has seen anything this enormous before.
“But many of those involved will no longer be around in another five years. Jeane Freeman stood down as Health Secretary in 2021, Humza Yousaf is leaving politics in 2026 and Nicola Sturgeon is not expected to continue as an MSP either.
“It keeps me awake at night to think that nobody will be held accountable for all those deaths but I do believe the police and the Crown are taking it seriously; they wouldn’t be down at my house so often if they weren’t. I just can’t see them wasting the time of all these cops if there’s going to be nothing at the end of it.”
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