DAILY MAIL COMMENT: Something rotten at the heart of the Met

DAILY MAIL COMMENT: Something rotten at the heart of the Met

08/06/2019

DAILY MAIL COMMENT: Something rotten at the heart of the Met

Allegations by the serial fantasist Carl Beech (pictured) concerning the supposed torture and murder of boys by Establishment figures were riddled with inconsistencies

The inquiry into allegations of a VIP sex abuse ring codenamed Operation Midland ranks as the most disgraceful episode in the recent history of the Metropolitan Police. 

A scandal suggesting something rotten in the state of our law-enforcement system.

Acting on the flimsiest pretext, Scotland Yard officers invaded the homes of innocent people in lightning raids, employing search warrants obtained after a court was deceived. 

In an omission described by an eminent former High Court judge as a perversion of justice and potentially criminal, the investigating team failed to disclose evidence that undermined the case for the house searches, carried out in the full glare of national publicity and resulting in enormous distress for those involved.

These were not the misguided acts of a few inexperienced junior officers but the systematic violation of that most basic of rights — the one protecting law-abiding householders from the arbitrary invasion of their homes by agents of the state. 

This outrage was sanctioned in the highest reaches of the Met and carried out by detectives displaying a cavalier and contemptuous attitude towards due process.

Operation Midland was a rogue investigation fuelled by an insane Met policy demanding that alleged victims of sexual abuse should not only be listened to seriously but automatically believed.

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Society bestows upon the police the right to enter private premises if there are reasonable grounds for doing so during a criminal inquiry — and this privilege should be dependent upon officers using this power wisely and proportionately. Otherwise, we will be living in a banana republic.

That the Midland team — backed by then Deputy Assistant Commissioner Steve Rodhouse, now operations chief of the National Crime Agency — abused this power is made abundantly clear in documents obtained by the Mail.

As this scandal — exposed not by politicians or the official police watchdog but by a Mail investigation — emerges, it poses the question: who effectively polices the police?

Our report today reveals investigators had evidence which made it clear allegations by the serial fantasist Carl Beech concerning the supposed torture and murder of boys by Establishment figures were riddled with inconsistencies but these doubts were not placed before the judge granting the search warrants.

This resulted in untold misery for the targets of the search operation — Field Marshal Lord Bramall, one of Britain’s most distinguished soldiers, the late Lord Brittan and former MP Harvey Proctor.

There were no less than eight separate factors casting doubt on Beech’s version of events. Despite nationwide publicity, no witnesses had come forward to verify his story, and indeed there was no evidence of other victims even existing.

The inconsistencies resulted in untold misery for the targets of the search operation, including Field Marshal Lord Bramall, one of Britain’s most distinguished soldiers

Yet, these failings and other salient facts were not disclosed to the judge who authorised the raids.

This grievous misconduct is there in black and white — in the applications for the search warrants submitted in court. 

In a declaration by the officer seeking a warrant to search Lord Bramall’s home, he agrees that: ‘To the best of my knowledge and belief: This application discloses all the information that is material to what the court must decide, including anything that might reasonably be considered capable of undermining any of the grounds of the application.’

Answering the requirement for ‘duty of disclosure’ in the case of anything that might call into question the credibility of information received by investigators, the officer enters the response ‘N/A’ — not applicable.

This is utterly false — and it ended in detectives rampaging through the lives of innocent people, living and dead, in a deranged witch-hunt masquerading as a responsible criminal investigation.

All at the behest of Beech, a grandstanding Walter Mitty whose account of devilish sex parties involving Establishment figures torturing and murdering boys would strain the credulity of a sceptical layman, never mind the seasoned detectives of Scotland Yard.

Incompetence on an epic scale is clearly a major ingredient of this fiasco, with common sense flying out of the window. But it is contempt for the law — bordering on criminality — combined with a total disregard for the consequences for individuals that is the mark of this dark farce.

Are Labour afraid of shining too much light on the role in this sordid affair of deputy leader Tom Watson, who stoked the frenzy resulting in Midland?

The retired High Court judge who reviewed Midland following its implosion, Sir Richard Henriques, believes some of the police officers involved should face criminal investigation. Amazingly, his full findings are still unavailable to the public — a scandal in itself.

The Met is sticking by its claim that Midland was carried out in good faith. In a weasel-worded statement, it admits that it ‘did not get everything right’ but reminds us that it was conducted under ‘intense scrutiny’. The answer to which is, so what?

The treatment of the Midland victims was appalling. But they were prominent people with access to lawyers. Imagine if this had involved poorer, less prominent families — what chance would they have had of redress? Would these abuses ever have come to light?

And what of the Independent Office for Police Conduct, the supposed police watchdog, which managed to exonerate some of the officers involved without even bothering to interview them? Its credibility as an impartial investigator of alleged malpractice is fatally compromised.

Labour is in the frame, too. Commons home affairs committee chair Yvette Cooper dodges calls for a parliamentary inquiry, while Mayor of London Sadiq Khan is equally mealy-mouthed. 

Are they afraid of shining too much light on the role in this sordid affair of Labour deputy leader Tom Watson, who stoked the frenzy resulting in Midland?

This imbroglio may not have been the creation of current Commissioner Cressida Dick but it is eating away at the credibility of her force. She must act — and decisively.

Today the Mail demands that the Commissioner publish the Henriques report in full and establish a robust independent inquiry, possibly involving an outside police force. There should also be a thorough review of the workings of the IOPC.

The time has come for people to be called to account, via an independent criminal investigation.

The law is the law — whoever the culprit.

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