The Times - UK (2020-08-03)

the times | Monday August 3 2020 2GM 5

News

The alleged victim of a senior Con-
servative MP arrested on suspicion of
raping a former parliamentary aide has
said that she was “devastated” that he
was not suspended from the party.
Mark Spencer, the chief whip, is
understood to have decided not to take
immediate action against the MP until
the police investigation was concluded.
Last night the alleged victim criti-
cised the party’s failure to take action
despite being aware of the allegations.
“It’s insulting and shows they never
cared,” she told The Times.
The former researcher, who cannot
be identified, says that she was assault-
ed four times between July 2019 and
January this year, including claims of a
rape necessitating hospital treatment.
Labour said that it sent a “terrible
message” that senior figures were able
to secure “protection” through their
Westminster status.
The former minister was interviewed
under caution at a police station in east

London on Saturday after his accuser

was interviewed by Scotland Yard

officers at a separate location on Friday.

He was accused of coercing the

woman into having sex with him while

they were in a relationship.

Last week The Times revealed that

the woman had raised her allegations

with Mr Spencer in April. However, the

chief whip did not take any action

against the MP and did not encourage

the alleged victim to contact the police.

She accused him of evading ques-

tions about when he would suspend the

whip from the MP. She added: “I felt like

he did not take me seriously or recog-

The wife of the former MP Charlie
Elphicke said yesterday that she had
decided to divorce him before his
conviction for sexually assaulting two
women, having found flirtatious text
messages sent to one of his victims.
Natalie Elphicke, 49, who replaced
her husband as Conservative MP for
Dover at the general election in
December, announced on Twitter that
their marriage was over 33 minutes
after he was found guilty last Thursday.
She filed for divorce the following day.

ISLAND VISIONS/BNPS

Alleged rape victim devastated

by failure to suspend Tory MP

Esther Webber
Oliver Wright Policy Editor

nise the severity of what had hap-

pened.”

It is understood that Mr Spencer does

not believe that a sexual assault was

reported to him in his conversation

with the complainant but he acknowl-

edges that she reported abusive

behaviour and threats.

The decision not to suspend the whip

was taken for fear that the MP could

then be identified before the allegations

had been assessed by the police.

Jess Phillips, the shadow safeguard-

ing minister, criticised the Conserva-

tives for failing to suspend the whip

from the ex-minister. She told Times

Radio: “Any organisation — especially

one like members of parliament who

every day work with vulnerable people,

young activists, members of staff — in

any other organisation, were this police

investigation to be going on, somebody

would be suspended while the

investigation was taking place.”

Robert Jenrick, the housing secretary,

said he did not know the name of the

MP involved but he was “confident” the

party was taking the matter seriously.

A former teacher at one of Britain’s

leading preparatory schools has died

shortly after being charged with a

historical sex offence.

Tim Harbord spent 25 years at Colet

Court, the junior division of St Paul’s

School, in Barnes, southwest London.

He resigned after concern was raised in

2013 about his closeness to a pupil. It

later emerged that a complaint against

him had been made as early as 1990 but

no action was taken.

Mr Harbord, 67, was arrested in 2013

on suspicion of the sexual grooming of

a child. A year later he was again

arrested and questioned about the

alleged sexual assault of a child.

The second arrest was part of Opera-

tion Winthorpe, a police inquiry

launched after The Times revealed mul-

tiple allegations of the past sexual abuse

of boys by teachers at the school. On

both occasions Mr Harbord was re-

leased without charge. He told The

Times that he vehemently denied all al-

legations against him.

St Paul’s, and former pupils whose

allegations against the teacher formed

part of Operation Winthorpe, are un-

derstood to have been notified of his

death by police. An officer is said to

have told one former pupil that the

teacher took his own life after being

charged with indecent assault.

Mark Bailey, the high master of St

Paul’s, shared the news on Friday. He

wrote to parents: “It is possible that he

taught some pupils who will be entering

the Upper Eighth [Year 13] in Septem-

ber, and they may find these circum-

stances distressing.”

More than 80 former pupils told

police of sex crimes allegedly commit-

ted by 32 teachers over several decades

at the senior school or at Colet Court.

Five former teachers were convicted

of offences against boys or the posses-

sion of child abuse images.

Sex-charge

prep teacher

found dead

Henry Dyer, Andrew Norfolk

Elphicke’s wife speaks out after humiliating trial

In an interview with The Sun on Sunday

she described the case as “unpleasant,

horrible, upsetting and humiliating”.

Elphicke, who has been told that he

faces jail when he is sentenced next

month, assaulted his first victim in 2007

after chasing her around the family

home in Belgravia, central London. He

was elected in 2010 and attacked the

second woman in 2016 in Westminster.

Ms Elphicke, 49, attended Southwark

crown court with him every day of the

trial. She informed her 13-year-old son

of the verdict before telling Elphicke

that their 25-year marriage was over.

She said that she realised that her

husband had “a genuine and true

infatuation” with his second young vic-

tim while reading his texts, which were

included in court documents.

“I recognised the Charlie I knew in

those texts. It was like turning back the

clock to when we were first together,”

she said. “I couldn’t help contrast them

with the kinds of text messages he was

sending to me at the time, which said

things like ‘Can you pick up the milk?’

or ‘Which one of us is picking the kids

up?’ Emotionally it was a bridge too far.”

During the police investigation

Elphicke confessed to a two-year affair

with a third woman who was not a com-

plainant in the court case. Ms Elphicke

said: “She was a local woman and one of

the most hurtful and difficult things is

that people who I knew knew some-

thing and didn’t tell me. Why is the wife

always the last to know?”

She said that after the allegations first

emerged in 2017 she had feared that her

husband might kill himself. “I don’t

regret standing by my husband,” she

said. “I believe in the rule of law and

innocent until proven guilty. But I

accept the verdict too.”

David Brown

Behind the story

A

ppeal

judges

clamped

down on

the naming

of arrested suspects

recently in a ruling

that has triggered

concern among media

lawyers (Jonathan

Ames writes).

In June, three

judges ruled against

Bloomberg, the US

news company, after it

named an American

businessman under

investigation by a UK

financial authority.

The Court of

Appeal said that there

was an expectation of

privacy in criminal

investigations until a

suspect is charged.

Media lawyers fear

that the ruling could

restrict the reporting

of crime and it

remains technically

legal to name arrested

suspects.

After the ruling,

Pia Sarma, the Times

editorial legal

director, wrote in this

newspaper of “the

need to preserve the

scrutiny of police

wielding the

enormous power of

arrest, which can be

so devastating for

people who are

wrongly accused”.

Night visions An astrophotographer, Jamie Russell, captured Saturn (1); Jupiter (2); the Milky Way (3); and the moon (4) with a prolonged night-time exposure over St Catherine’s Down on the Isle of Wight

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