Lady Brittan has condemned the police watchdog for clearing all officers involved in an operation which pursued claims of child abuse against her late husband, after an independent report accused police of dozens of errors in investigating the accusations.
The Daily Telegraph reported that the wife of the late Lord Brittan, the Jewish MP who served as Home Secretary from 1983 to 1985, described the system of investigating officers for misconduct, conducted by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), as “fundamentally flawed.”
The accusations were subsequently found to have been fabricated by the accuser Carl Beech, who was revealed to have been a paedophile himself. Beech was charged with perverting the course of justice and jailed in July for 18 years.
An independent review, commissioned by the Metropolitan Police and conducted by retired High Court judge Sir Richard Henriques, of this investigation - Operation Midland - highlighted dozens of mistakes by officers in charge of investigating claims that former high-profile politicians had abused, tortured and in some cases killed children.
