Peter Bremner

Dr. Peter Bremner (pseudonym for Roger Nash), was a member of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE's) Executive Committee, which he had joined in 1977. British newspaper the Daily Express (1984) described Bremner as a "doctor of philosophy." At 45-years-old in 1984, he was convicted and sent to prison for 6 month on one count of sending an "indecent article" (i.e. piece of writing) by post. At the time, he had one previous court appearance in 1978, for three charges of indecent assault on three separate boys for which he was given suspended sentences.

Bremner assisted in PIE's prisoner support scheme, which found correspondents for inmates who were PIE members, sought sponsors to cover the expenses of their membership, and mailed them recommended books and items from the press service. PIE Chairman Steve Smith (later Steve Freeman), wrote in 1984:

There had been several major stories on PIE since Tom O'Carroll was convicted, each of which had repercussions far beyond the immediate distress inflicted on the committee members named, and illustrate well the harm which the gutter press can cause.

The first of these stories (NOTW, March 22nd., 1981) was occasioned by PIE having to open a new post Office box, the sponsor of our previous box, David Grove, having died. The Post Office leaked the home address of our new sponsor, Peter Bremner, to the NOTW so fast that the reporters were at his door before the box had even been used, and before the Executive Committee itself, let alone our members, knew where the P.O. Box was located.

The Trial and End of PIE: Peter Bremner's Case

Peter Brenmer stood trial alongside PIE member David Joy, who were charged with offences relating to the 6th Issue of the PIE magazine Contact, dated July 1982. Bremner was charged with sending an "indecent article" (i.e. piece of writing) to an undercover agent ("Mr. Oxley"), which he did not believe to be illegal under UK law.

On 17th May 1983, police officers interviewed Bremner. In a subsequent trial lasting 6 days, the unnamed article at issue is described as a piece that had been translated by Joy, and judged as having a "tendency [...] to corrupt" in court. It was accepted in court that "he [Bremner] did not know that obscenity would be contained in it." "He told Mr. Oxley that he wished the magazine to be within the law," but as Bremner ultimately "held the post office box number of P.I.E.," he "was therefore [judged as] certainly responsible for its in-coming mail, [as] he was also a member of the executive which were together responsible for for all that emanated from that organisation." He received a sentence of 6 months imprisonment for one count of distributing an "indecent article" by post.

It has been claimed online that Bremner edited PIE magazine Minor Problems, which was stocked and sold in Ian Campbell Dunn's Edinburgh bookshop, Lavender Menace, but we are unable to verify this claim's accuracy. Little is known about Bremner's life after PIE disbanded and after he was released from prison.