Why on earth did the Metropolitan Police seemingly do nothing about that letter?
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Police → do → letter
It is one of the most perplexing questions in the horrible saga of Thomas Markle Snr and the accusations levelled against him.
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It → level → him
I mean of course the letter written by Mr Markle’s Snr’s late first wife Roslyn Loveless, which was passed to the Met in 2019 and which accused her ex-husband of being a serial abuser of children.
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which → mean → children
The police disclosed its contents to Meghan Markle, presumably because she was by then a member of the British Royal Family, having married Prince Harry the previous year.
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she → disclose → Harry
Beyond that, it seems they did nothing – they did not pass on the information to any of the relevant authorities abroad who might have investigated it.
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who → seem → it
Everyone is innocent until proven guilty, and we cannot know at this stage whether the first Mrs Markle’s claims were well-grounded.
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claims → prove → stage
Mr Markle Snr insists he is innocent and that the latest accusations are ‘sick lies’.
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accusations → insist → ?
Even so, you would have thought that if the Met felt that the contents of the letter were important enough to pass on to the duchess, they should have been investigated by an institution that could get to the truth.
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that → think → truth
It is a conundrum that has given rise to all manner of speculation, and has led some to question if there could have been a ‘nothing-to-see-here’ type of cover-up back in 2019, either by the police or even, God forbid, the Palace.
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God → give → police
The handwritten letter by Roslyn Loveless was sent to the Met’s Fixated Threat Assessment Centre that deals with stalkers and ‘fixated individuals’ targeting public figures.
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that → send → figures
She was a sad, alcoholic wreck of a human being who died two years ago.
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who → die → being
Why on Earth did the Metropolitan Police seemingly do nothing about that letter?
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Police → do → letter
It is one of the most perplexing questions in the horrible saga of Thomas Markle Snr, writes AN Wilson
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Wilson → write → Snr
The letter to the Met was sent 44 years after her marriage to Mr Markle Snr ended, and she was described by her daughter, Meghan’s half-sister Samantha, 61, as ‘not credible’, driven by ‘hatred and bitterness’.
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she → send → hatred
Perhaps the assessment centre took the same view as Samantha and so took no further action.
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centre → take → action
But why, then, was Meghan informed at all?
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Meghan → inform → ?
And however ‘not credible’ Ms Loveless might have been, her letter reportedly declared that Mr Markle Snr – who again denies the claims – had travelled to Thailand and the Philippines for sex with minors.
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who → declare → minors
If there was the slightest possibility that minors were being abused – the most deeply-disturbing concern in all of this – the police surely had a duty to act.
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police → be → duty
Jim Gamble, an international campaigner against child sexual abuse, told Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday that the Met’s failure to share information with overseas authorities could have left children with an ‘extended exposure’ to possible abuse in the seven years since the letter was sent.
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letter → tell → years
Mr Gamble, former head of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, said it was ‘really difficult to understand’ the Met’s decision, given that it had deemed the letter credible enough to tell the duchess and the royal protection team about.
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letter → say → duchess
He added: ‘If you get information that comes to you about someone from a foreign jurisdiction who represents a threat to children, there’s a well-worn path and you’d expect a UK police force to share that information.
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force → add → information
‘I would have expected the Metropolitan Police either to have gone to the FBI Legat, the legal attaché in the embassy here, to say, “look, this isn’t proven – it’s an allegation.
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it → expect → embassy
You might want to look at it because in America you may have more information to add to this, so you can see whether you can corroborate it.”
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you → want → it
The police disclosed its contents to Meghan presumably because she was by then a member of the Royal family, having married Prince Harry the previous year
He is not alone in this view.
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He → disclose → view
Dai Davies, the former head of Scotland Yard’s Royal Protection Command, said he was ‘gobsmacked’ that the Met had not contacted any other law enforcement bodies about the allegations.
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Met → say → allegations
‘I’m frankly astounded that, having received this material, they did not contact other relevant forces...
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they → ’m → forces
I believe they had a duty of care not only to Meghan but to any alleged victims to investigate.’
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they → believe → victims
Let’s consider the Met’s failure to act for a moment.
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’s → let → moment
It means that if the allegations were true, the supposed perpetrator has had a further seven years in
which to prey upon children in different parts of the world, by meeting them, or by watching them online.
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perpetrator → mean → them
We are told that hundreds, thousands, of pieces of evidence have been removed from Thomas Markle Snr’s home in the Philippines, after purportedly being discovered by his son, Thomas Jnr.
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thousands → tell → son
Obviously, we cannot comment on what those pieces of evidence are with any confidence.
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pieces → comment → confidence
But within the poisonously-divided Markle family, furious rows are now blazing over them.
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rows → divide → them
Meghan’s half-sister Samantha has accused Thomas Markle Jnr of concocting the story in order to make money.
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Samantha → accuse → money
Eventually, the truth will out, however.
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truth → out → ?
And, whatever it is, I am bound to say it is not looking good for the royals.
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it → bind → royals
We are either talking about Roslyn Loveless and Thomas Markle Jnr telling lies on a truly prodigious scale.
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Loveless → talk → scale
And this allegedly perpetrated by the father-in-law of the man who is fifth in line to the throne.
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who → perpetrate → throne
Meghan’s own personal response to these claims, therefore, must also be subjected to the most careful forensic scrutiny.
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response → subject → scrutiny
In 2022, three years after the Met showed her the letter full of allegations against her father, Meghan said in her and Harry’s Netflix documentary that she had always been ‘a Daddy’s girl’
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she → show → documentary
In 2022, three full years after the Met showed her the letter full of allegations against her father, she said in her and Harry’s Netflix documentary that she had always been ‘a daddy’s girl’.
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she → show → documentary
…and 15 more, not listed.
The Aporia
