(207) Justice, Majors and inaccurate spelling of (and from) Portia

When it was announced in October 2003 that Major Charles Ingram had been found guilty of a second offence, at Bournemouth Crown Court, I feared for him, and, thinking that this new conviction could activate his suspended sentence which he had received in March, I sent out articles in his defence to various journals and also to individuals concerned with miscarriages of justice, e.g. Michael Mansfield Q.C. But the only responses were from journalist Bob Woffinden and a Mr Tom Watkins, who ran an internet site called Portia.org. 

Accordingly, it was there that the first draft of my essay was posted. 

On the BBC1 Real Story programme of November 24th 2003, which was about the Ingram family, they misspelled the name of the Major´s daughter as ´Porcia Ingram´. 

On March 2nd 2004 I spoke with people who had a holiday home in our street: Bill and Ruth Smith of Cookley in the West Midlands. I said that our cat, KGB, was sick, but did not mention that a boy who had been living in the street had stoned him, and that the cat had developed a cancer on his flank at the precise spot where a stone had been seen to land. His family had acknowledged the incidents but refused to apologise. I had told them that I found their refusal "disgusting and disgraceful." Ruth said that she had a cat who died of cancer at the age of nine, called Portia. She explained that its original name was Porsche, but that had been altered. 

On June 21st 2004 I saw the TV programme University Challenge; The Professionals. Normally teams of four university students competed, but these teams were different: they were professionals from particular walks of life. This match was: The Journalists Vs The Army. 

The Army team was comprised of four Majors. The first was Major Law. One of the other Majors suggested "Portia" as the correct answer to a Shakespeare question, the right answer actually being "Miranda". 

The Merchant of Venice is a rabidly anti-Semitic play. In the fourth act a lawyer turns around a desparate case where a nasty Jew, Shylock, is about to have a court permit him to cut a pound of flesh from the breast of the merchant, Antonio, through Antonio having defaulted on the repayment of a loan. The borrowed money Antonio had lent to his friend, Bassanio, so that he could pursue a (successful) suit for the hand of Portia. 

The lawyer is actually this very lady, Portia, in disguise. 

Portia Ingram is Jewish. 

She is also dyslexic.