The director general of the despised dissatisfied dissatisfaction spent thousands of public books in French luxury hotels while entering courses in an elite business school where the president of her organization has held positions.
Karen Kneller, Managing Director of the Criminal Affairs Examination Commissionis known for having regularly attended the INSEAD business school in Fontainebleau in the past five years.
Kneller’s stays included a director’s course whose costs are currently announced At more than £ 21,000 for a teaching of 10 days on three trips, as well as a week -long program on “digital disturbance and innovation”. She also took a three -day “chair” course in 2021, the fees of which are currently £ 7,500.
Helen Pitcher, the former president of the CCRC, held several positions at INSEAD while Kneller took these courses, in particular as chairman of the board of directors of business school administrators.
Launcher resigned from the CCRC this monthSaying that she had been “scapegoat” on the Andrew Malkinson affair after an independent panel judged that she was no longer in the form of being a chair. Malkinson I spent 17 years in prison for a rape of 2003 that he did not commit.
Now, as the organization has been responsible for examining whether a New Evidence In the case of Lucy Ledby, deserves a return to the Court of Appeal, the CCRC should take up a renewed examination. Some staff have raised fears that the organization’s leadership will not be up to the task.
Kneller regularly returned to Insead, more recently staying in a luxury room in his four -star hotel for a week of training in December. The Ermitage hotel includes a terrace bar overlooking the Fontainebleau forest, a fitness center and Squash courts.
The course costs do not include the cost of staying at the hotel, until £ 194 at night, nor travel, which would have been covered by the CCRC. Some of Kneller’s courses were in London but the Guardian understands that most were France.
As CEO and head of accounting, the CCRC said that Kneller is “responsible for the safeguarding of public funds assigned to us and to guarantee the convenience and regularity of the management of these public funds”.
A staff member said that there was a clear “conflict of interest” for Kneller sent on courses of an institution launcher was involved in “in a place that is much more expensive than the very similar courses available in the United Kingdom ”.
A government source said that spending “did not reflect the expectations of the new government concerning the best use of CCRC financing”.
A spokesperson for Pitcher said that the Ministry of Justice had approved the profitability analysis for Kneller to attend INSEAD. They also declared that all external interests, including the association of launchers with the business school, were “fully declared according to the CCRC directives”.
The roles of the launcher at INSEAD while Kneller took courses included the chairman of his board of directors of the administrators’ network and the chairmanship of his director club LTD until October 2022. The launcher was also part of the Executive Committee From the Association of Elders of INSEAD and vice-president of its world clubs until July 2023.
Insead was assessed the best European business school by the Financial Times in 2024 and describes itself as “the business school in the world”.
The launcher said in his resignation letter that “the main criticism” made by her by the panel who decided that she was not able to continue as president focused on the question of whether I “dispute enough The performance “of the CEO and certain staff members that she was responsible for”.
In a statement to The Guardian, a spokesperson for Pitcher said that she had been informed when he arrived at the CCRC to withdraw the entire management team, but decided that “was not viable” and rather chose “Mentor and training senior executives”, making improvements that have been recognized in each assessment.
“Staff surveys (during the mandate of the launcher) were invariably positive, apart from the responses of a small group known to the CEO and its best team,” they said.
The Guardian revealed this month that Kneller had been accused of having tried to “Disinfect” an independent review in the treatment by its organization of the Malkinson case. After this story, Kneller told the staff in a weekly briefing that it was a “return to business as usual” and that “nothing has changed and that there is no news”.
An independent review last year revealed that the Watchdog missed several opportunities to help Malkinson. Chris Henley KC found that Malkinson could have been exempt Almost a decade earlier If the CCRC had properly understood forensic evidence.
Kneller was director of cases where the CCRC has undertaken what Henley described as “Very poor” Work on Malkinson’s first request to reverse his conviction. Leading legal personalities have described Its position as “completely untenable”, after more than two decades to the organization.
Kneller and the CCRC were approached to comment. A government spokesperson said: “This training course was fully funded from the CCRC budget. Training expenditure of the length of the arms which exceeds £ 10,000 must be approved by the sponsorship department and are subsequently approved by the Office firm. »»