Flack’s mother criticises lawyer for ‘deeply regrettable’ comments
CAROLINE FLACK’S mother said it is “deeply regrettable” that a lawyer who told a Sunday newspaper that prosecutors were right to pursue the Love Island presenter’s trial, “could not have let my beautiful daughter rest in peace”.
Ed Beltrami, who was the head of the Crown Prosecution Service’s (CPS) north London division at the time but has since started a new role as Wales’s chief prosecutor, told the Wales on Sunday newspaper that he could not just do what he thought would be “popular”.
The TV presenter took her own life in February aged 40.
Her mother, Chris Flack, said in a statement to her local newspaper the Eastern Daily Press: “It is deeply regrettable that Mr Beltrami could not have let my beautiful daughter rest in peace.
“It is as regrettable that he should choose to repeat some of
the untruths about my daughter. My daughter was unable to defend herself during her life and is unable to do so now. Shame on you.”
Flack, who grew up in Norfolk, died at her London home while awaiting trial on an assault charge for an alleged attack on her boyfriend Lewis Burton.
Mr Beltrami said: “You’ve got to do what you think is right. You cannot do what you think is popular.”
He added that when the decision was taken to proceed with the case, “you have absolutely no idea that the defendant is going to take her own life”.
Chris Flack said: “Mr Beltrami says that the CPS ‘had no idea’ that my daughter may take her life when they decided to continue the case against her.
“If that is true then the CPS ignored the correspondence from my daughter’s solicitors and a psychologist’s report warning of just that possibility.”
Mr Beltrami said that the charge could not be dropped just because Mr Burton did not want the incident to be brought before the courts, adding: “You just don’t fold at the first sign of trouble the fact that the victim doesn’t want to know.”