Operation Midland’s guilty men were never held to account

On March 4, 2015, I sat in the bedroom of my home, an old farmhouse overlooking the rolling beauty of the Vale of Belvoir, sipping tea with my partner, Terry. It was an ordinary early morning – until an unexpected knock shattered its peace.

Through the glass, I saw the police. My first thought was that something was afoot at Belvoir Castle, where I worked as Private Secretary for the Duke and Duchess of Rutland. But as I opened the door, my world collapsed. A police officer handed me a search warrant. Subsequently, I now know it was an illegal warrant. Then, like an invading force, around 20 Metropolitan Police officers, the majority in pale blue forensic suits, stormed my home, and a little later, my office in the Estate Office. The raid was part of Operation Midland: the disastrous police investigation based on the delusions, fuelled by fame and fortune, of Carl Beech.

After almost 30 years of rebuilding my life since my ordeal in 1987 which ended my long-coveted parliamentary career, yet again, at the hands of the police, I became a monster overnight in the eyes of the public.