Met chief apologises to Brittan’s widow
SIR Bernard Hogan-Howe finally caved into pressure yesterday and made a ‘full’ personal apology to Leon Brittan’s widow Diana for pursuing a baseless rape claim against the l ate former Home Secretary.
The Scotland Yard chief said sorry for how his force had handled the false allegation, still hanging over the Tory peer’s head when he died from cancer 13 months ago aged 75.
His unreserved apology is understood to have surprised Lady Brittan, who is seeking ‘retrospective justice’ for her husband over the bogus rape claim and separate allegations of murder and abuse made by a suspected serial fantasist known as ‘Nick’.
She accepted Sir Bernard’s apology but asked the Met Commissioner to answer 30 key questions she put him at an 80-minute meeting at the Goring Hotel in Central London.
He promised to answer them in writing in the coming weeks, after which Lady Brittan may make a further statement about her husband’s treatment at the hands of Scotland Yard.
The Brittan family made it clear they thought that Sir Bernard had apologised for how it handled both the rape case and Nick’s allegations against the peer.
But speaking after the meeting, the Yard boss indicated he had only said sorry for the way his force had dealt with the historical rape allegation against Lord Brittan. He conceded there would have been no chance of a successful prosecution in the case had the peer still been alive.
Critics said Sir Bernard should also make a clear, full apology to Lady Brittan for the fiasco surrounding Operation Midland – the inquiry into allegations of a VIP paedophile ring.
Later, Sir Bernard told BBC Radio London he had apologised to Lord widow: ‘We had a private conversation. It was a constructive one and I hope she found it helpful.
‘It is an apology for not telling her at an early stage that Lord Brittan, who by that stage unfortunately had died, was not to be prosecuted in the future.’