Peter Bremner
Dr. David Peter Bremner (d. Jun 2019, age 79) was founder of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE's) East London local group, and a member of the Executive Committee which he joined in 1977. Sometimes referred to in the press as David Bremner, or identified by his old activist pseudonym Roger Nash, he was known to his friends as Peter. While the British newspaper the Daily Express (1984) described Bremner as a "doctor of philosophy,"[1] he was in-fact a doctor of biochemistry. Having undertaken a biochemistry PhD at London University, Peter embarked on a career as a research biochemist, and worked mainly on attachment to hospitals in Britain's capital.
Bremner was a close friend and supporter of the most notorious PIE Chairperson Tom O'Carroll, and he succeeded O'Carroll as PIE's representative on the gay rights committee of the National Council for Civil Liberties, now known as Liberty. He appeared on the BBC's Newsnight TV programme to make the case for consensual child-adult sexual relations. He was also deeply involved in the 1980s with producing the youth rights journal Minor Problems.
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.[2] 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.[2]
The Trial and End of PIE: Peter Bremner's Case
In 1984, at 45-years-old, Peter Bremner was convicted and sent to prison for 6 month on one count of sending an "indecent article" (i.e. piece of writing) by post. He was acquitted of more serious charges. 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.
Peter Brenmer stood trial alongside PIE member David Joy. They 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.[3]
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."[3] "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.[3]
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 the accuracy of these claims.[4] Other than his attendance at Ipce meetings, and passion for Egyptology, little is known about Bremner's life after PIE disbanded and after he was released from prison, with Thomas O'Carroll relaying some details.[5]
Later years and Death
Peter Bremner died in June 2019 at the age of 79, after being ill for some years with cancer of the liver.
References
- ↑ Tony Dawe, Child-sex men fear jail revenge (Daily Express, 15th November 1984).
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Steven Adrian Smith, "PIE, from 1980 Until its Demise in 1985," in The Betrayal of Youth: Radical Perspectives on Childhood Sexuality, Intergeneratioal Sex, and the Social Oppression of Children and Young People, ed. by Warren Middleton (CL Publications: London, 1986). [IPCE Link - External link].
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Brenmer and Joy Court of Appeal - Wordpress blog.
- ↑ See Ian Campbell Dunn (Conservapedia profile).
- ↑ A Tale of Two Activists