Harvey Proctor: VIP child abuse ring claims ‘ravings of a fantasist’, ex-Tory MP tells court

Former politician breaks down when describing aftermath of police raid on his home

An ex-MP accused of paedophilia and child murder by the police informant known as “Nick” has described the claims as the “ravings of a fantasist”.

Harvey Proctor, a Conservative MP from 1979 to 1983, broke down as he told jurors of seeing his own face staring out of the television in a news report the morning after police investigating the allegations raided his home.

The former politician faced defendant Carl Beech at Newcastle Crown Court and described accusations that he was a killer and sadistic sexual abuser as “wrong, malicious, false, horrendous”, and the product of a “polluted imagination”.

Beech, 51, from Gloucester, himself a convicted paedophile and voyeur, denies 12 counts of perverting the course of justice and one of fraud stemming from accusations he fabricated the claims against Mr Proctor and others.

Mr Proctor told the court: “There was no Westminster paedophile ring.” He also poured scorn on what he called the “extraordinary” step previously taken by police of describing Beech’s allegations as “credible and true”.

Jurors had previously been shown video of a police interview in which the defendant told detectives he saw Mr Proctor rape and murder a boy by stabbing him in the arm and choking him in 1980.

Beech, a father of one, also claimed Mr Proctor was involved in the murder of another unknown child in a London townhouse.

Asked by Tony Badenoch QC, prosecuting, to respond to the allegation that he strangled a child, Mr Proctor said: “The allegation is false. It emanates from a polluted imagination. The allegations are horrendous, dreadful.

“I had nothing to do with them. I don’t believe they took place.”

Questioned over the townhouse murder allegation, Mr Proctor said: “Not true, I had nothing to do with that, I do not believe that took place, these are more ravings of a fantasist.”

When he was interviewed by police for the first time for six hours in 2015, Mr Proctor told officers they had got it wrong. He explained to jurors: “It was tiring answering questions for such a lengthy period of time in a subject which was extremely unpleasant and distasteful.

“I believed I had a duty to myself to try to persuade the police they were being taken for a ride.”

He became emotional when he recalled in March 2015 seeing his face on the BBC news the morning after his home in the grounds of Belvoir Castle was raided by murder squad detectives from the Metropolitan Police.

The 72-year-old said he slept badly the night after detectives from the Metropolitan Police’s murder squad searched his property in connection with “historic child sexual abuse” for 15 hours, and that he had inadvertently left his television on as he went to bed.

He said: “I looked up at the television screen to see my face looking back at me, and a story ran on the head of the BBC news television programme that my property had been searched in connection with historic sexual abuse, including child murders.”

Mr Proctor said he had been determined to face the allegations and went on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, where he said he knew little about the claims against him and it was a “Kafkaesque situation, a horrendous, irrational nightmare”.

He later lost the job he enjoyed, working for the Duke and Duchess of Rutland.

Beech had claimed Sir Edward Heath was among his tormentors – who also allegedly included top army officers and security chiefs – and said the former prime minister had intervened to stop Mr Proctor from cutting his genitals with a penknife.

Mr Proctor told the court he and Mr Heath were the “antithesis of friends”, disagreed on politics and disliked each other.

The case was adjourned until Friday.