Star witness in Janner sex case lied about abuse
A FORMER children’s home resident who is the principal source of accusations that the late politician Greville Janner was a paedophile made bogus claims that he was sexually abused by a woman at the care home where he lived.
A Mail on Sunday investigation has revealed that in 1991 Janner’s accuser, now middle-aged, made false allegations against Barbara Fitt, head of the Station Road home in Leicester – at the same time he first told police he had been abused by the Labour MP. Mrs Fitt was exonerated later that year but died suddenly aged 44, months after she was formally cleared.
Her widower Raymond, 79, said: ‘I can’t say this business was the reason she passed on. She was ill. But it was awful for her to go through that. They were false claims and they upset her terribly.’
Disclosure of the false claims is certain to have a dramatic impact on the Lord Janner Independent photographed in 2014 Inquiry Into Child Sexual Abuse under New Zealand judge Lowell Goddard, which will hear evidence on the Janner case next year.
The inquiry’s counsel, Ben Emmerson, QC, last week insisted it would make ‘findings of fact’ in the cases it considers.
Legal experts last night said the fact that the accuser – whom we will call Tony – made bogus sexual allegations against Mrs Fitt at the same time as he first accused Janner might have played an important part in the initial decision by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) not to charge the MP and peer as a child abuser.
Criminal law specialist Andrew Hall, QC, said: ‘If you are dealing with someone who has made allegations which have been investigated and shown to be baseless, that has to be taken into account when the decision is made whether to charge someone else on the basis of his evidence.’
Tony’s solicitor Liz Dux said: ‘While the inquiry is under way it would be inappropriate to comment on the evidence.’ The CPS said it could not comment. A Janner family friend said: ‘The family is horrified that the inquiry appears to be proceeding on the assumption Lord Janner was guilty. He was convicted of no offence.
‘It is an obscenity that the inquiry is insisting it will make findings of fact on the basis of evidence from people seeking compensation who cannot be cross-examined, when Lord Janner himself is dead and cannot answer back.’