House of Lords office of Labour peer searched over 'sex abuse' claims
POLICE have searched the House of Lords office of a Labour peer in a probe into child sex abuse claims.
Leicestershire Police searched the room used by Lord Greville Janner in March but have refused to say if anything was seized.
The father-of-three, 85, who was a Leicester MP for 27 years, was not arrested but a police file on him was passed to the Crown Prosecution Service in April.
It is unusual for police to search the Houses of Parliament as MPs and peers are usually protected by parliamentary privilege.
A police spokeswoman confirmed the search was in connection with “an ongoing inquiry into non-recent child sexual abuse” and that a search warrant had been obtained in advance from a Crown Court judge.
She added: “No arrests or charges have been made and inquiries continue.”
No arrests or charges have been made and inquiries continue
Lord Janner’s £600,000 flat in Hampstead, London, was searched by police in 2013.
The allegations are said to be linked to Frank Beck, who sexually abused more than 100 children in the 1970s and 1980s.
Beck, who ran children’s homes in Leicestershire, died in jail in 1995, four years after getting five life terms.
At Beck’s 1991 trial, a man claimed he was abused by Lord Janner when aged 13.
Lord Janner told the Commons in a statement there was “not a shred of truth” in the claims.
