Lord Janner’s son demands probe into police over Westminster abuse claims

Police officers who supported claims of a Westminster child abuse ring should be investigated following the conclusion of the Carl Beech trial, the son of the late Lord Janner has urged.

Daniel Janner QC (pictured), whose father Lord Janner of Braunstone QC faced allegations before he died, said police must be held accountable after a jury returned guilty verdicts for the fantasist who falsely claimed to have been a victim of a powerful VIP paedophile ring.

Detective Superintendent Kenny McDonald once called Beech’s admissions “credible and true”, but the prosecution called them “incredible and untrue” during the trial at Newcastle Crown Court.

The comments “gave other fantasists legs to run these things”, Mr Janner said.

“It is the police that have to be held to account for this. Just think of the costs of Operation Midland,” he told PA.

“My father’s wonderful name has been tarnished, and we’ve had to devote ourselves to fighting back.

“The policemen who put out that Carl Beech’s lies were ‘credible and true’ in 2014 should be prosecuted for the crime of misfeasance in a public office.

“In my judgment, there are ample grounds for prosecuting them because they were reckless amounting to misconduct.”

Allegations of child sex abuse made by Beech – previously only known as Nick – sparked a £2 million investigation known as Operation Midland, which saw officers raid the homes of those he accused.

Lord Janner was named in Beech’s allegations, made to the Metropolitan Police in October 2014.

A barrister and politician who was the subject of child sex abuse allegations dating back to 1955, Lord Janner died in 2015 after the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) decided it was not in the public interest to prosecute him.

The family of the former Labour peer have always maintained his innocence.

On comments made by police, Mr Janner said: “It means that false accusers are given strength.

“If people like Beech can come forward and the police say they are credible and true, well, it just leads to a whole host of other people coming forward.

“Of course there are genuine victims out there and the false accusers do them a serious disservice.”

He called the trial an “important step” in clearing his father’s name after all civil cases against him collapsed.

Mr Janner added: “Can you imagine what it’s like for my children and my grandchildren (to be told) that their grandfather raped and tortured this person in a club? It’s horrible.”

An inquiry into the allegations, launched by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse (IICSA), is due to take place in September.

But Mr Janner called for this strand of the IICSA to be “shut down” following the guilty verdicts.

“The strand in relation to my late father, and there’s a whole strand in relation to him, was set up as the first strand but that risks undermining the good work of IICSA,” he said.

“IICSA has done some good but in relation to my late father, after the Beech verdicts, they should shut it down, that strand.

“It’s more than a witch hunt, it’s a proxy prosecution of a dead man. He can’t answer back and we have no right to cross-examine.”

Mr Janner also called for the resignation of Labour deputy leader Tom Watson who, he claims, “started the moral frenzy” in 2012 and should “hang his head in shame”.

Mr Watson previously stood up in Parliament to claim there was a paedophile network with links to government.

Copyright (c) PA Media Ltd. 2019, All Rights Reserved. Picture (c) Dominic Lipinski / PA Wire.