VIP abuse accuser Carl Beech admits lying to police over 'witness'

An alleged VIP abuse fantasist has admitted lying to a detective in falsely naming a childhood friend as a witness who could back up his story.

Carl Beech, 51, from Gloucester, told Wiltshire Police in 2012 that someone called Aubrey was abused alongside him.

Police found an Aubrey whose details matched those given by Mr Beech but he was never abused in the way alleged. Mr Beech now says the boy was called John.

He denies 12 counts of perverting the course of justice and one of fraud.

The prosecution alleges that Mr Beech made up the allegations and wanted "money from the state" for his falsehoods.

Under cross-examination at Newcastle Crown Court, Mr Beech admitted telling lies during his initial interview with Wiltshire Police in December 2012.

Mr Beech claims a group of at least 12 senior figures from British public life sexually abused him and three other boys, who he says they murdered, in the 1970s and 1980s.

Among the people Mr Beech accused were former Conservative Prime Minister Sir Edward Heath and his colleague, former Home Secretary Lord Brittan.

The allegations led to a £2m Scotland Yard inquiry that ended without any arrests or charges.

Mr Beech accepted that, when he first spoke to Wiltshire Police at Swindon police station, he did not tell DC Mark Lewis everything he told the Metropolitan Police two years later.

Prosecutor Tony Badenoch QC took him through the transcript of his initial interview from 2012 in which only his stepfather, Major Ray Beech, and broadcaster Jimmy Savile were named as alleged abusers, with Mr Beech telling a detective: "I don't know the others".

There was also no mention of any alleged murders.

"There was some information that I just couldn't release to them" and "I assumed they would be able to find out the rest", Mr Beech told the court.

In the 2012 interview, Mr Beech told a detective that someone called Aubrey was his fellow victim.

The defendant now claims that a corroborative witness called John - whose surname he refuses to provide - was abused alongside him as a child.

"He couldn't possibly find John if he was looking for Aubrey," Mr Badenoch said of the Wiltshire detective.

Mr Badenoch said Mr Beech's entire account was "complete fantasy".

In 2016, when the investigation into Mr Beech's claims ended, the Met asked Northumbria Police to investigate the accuser himself

Jurors heard that investigators from Northumbria Police found an Aubrey Harding, who knew the defendant as a child. Both had lived in Bicester, in Oxfordshire, for a period during their childhood.

But Mr Harding, whose details matched those given by Mr Beech, was never abused.

Jurors were also shown a document written by Mr Beech and recovered from his home, describing allegations of abuse from a first person perspective, in which the name Aubrey was repeatedly used.

In court, Mr Beech said he had used the name Aubrey as a "pseudonym" for John.

When asked to provide further details about John, such as where he had lived, Beech said he had never asked him.

The prosecution allege that John was based on Mr Beech's best man at his wedding, John Prance, who would later confirm to Northumbria Police that he was never abused.

Met detectives spent months attempting to get John to come forward, first passing emails to him via Mr Beech, and then emailing with him directly.

But Northumbria Police discovered that the email address was actually created by Mr Beech.

The prosecution alleged that he had "intentionally misled officers" in order to get a crime reference number at a meeting with Wiltshire police in 2013.

He could then use to make a claim with the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority.

The defendant - who is charged with fraud for receiving £22,000 in compensation - denied this.

Mr Beech also told the court he was also abused by "diplomats" from the US and Saudi Arabia.

Jurors have previously heard that Mr Beech has refused to provide details about the foreigners, claiming he was afraid of doing so.

Mr Badenoch accused Mr Beech of making the accusations in order to add "credence to your story by introducing people who were just fiction".

The defendant said this was untrue.

When pressed by Mr Badenoch QC for locations where he claims to have been abused by the diplomats, the defendant said at hotels such as the Hilton and the Ritz, the Saudi Embassy, and the US ambassador's residence in London, Winfield House.

He said the American who abused him was called John Louis - and that the Saudis were called Abdullah and Turki.

The trial continues.