Gwent police will not be reopening an investigation related to the Jeremy Thorpe scandal after the force wrongly assumed one of the suspects was dead.
Detectives had believed Andrew Newton, who in the 1970s claimed he had been hired to kill Thorpe’s former lover Norman Scott, had died.
Officers told the Crown Prosecution Service Newton was deceased and the CPS passed on this information to Scott, explaining it meant the new investigation of the case was over.
But the case has hit the headlines again after the BBC’s well-received drama A Very English Scandal and a documentary on the former Liberal leader.
It emerged that Newton was not dead but living under a new name – Hann Redwin – in Dorking, Surrey.
The case is embarrassing to Gwent police, who were in charge of the new investigation, because though Newton had a new name he was hardly in hiding.
The link between the two names had emerged in public during an inquest and cursory Google checks reveal the connection.
It emerged on Monday that Redwin had rung Jeremy Vine’s BBC Radio 2 show after he was supposedly dead to talk about spring cleaning and how to remove mould from a shower curtain.
Police officers were spotted knocking on Newton’s – or Redwin’s – front door at the weekend but he did not appear to be at home.
On Monday, the force said it had reasonable grounds to conclude that Andrew Newton/Hann Redwin was deceased.
It said it had spoken to Newton/Redwin but he had given no new useful information.
Scott claims he had an affair with Thorpe in the 60s and that in 1975 the politician tried to have him killed.
Newton, a former pilot, made a bungled attempt to kill Scott – only succeeding in shooting his great Dane, Rinka. Newton was jailed and when he was released said he had been hired to kill Scott and implicated Thorpe and three other men.
All four were acquitted of conspiracy to murder in 1979 but Thorpe’s political career was in ruins and he stayed out of the public eye until his death in 2014.
Shortly afterwards, police launched the new inquiry after a man called Dennis Meighan, an antique firearms dealer, claimed he was also asked to kill Scott but refused to be involved.
Meighan said he spoke to police about the approach but his original statement vanished to be replaced by one that removed incriminating references to Thorpe and the Liberal party. Because Meighan was alleging police corruption, Avon and Somerset police asked a second force, Gwent, to look at this development.
Gwent launched Operation Velum but the investigation closed after concluding a key person in the story – Newton – was dead.
At the weekend, the Observer discovered that police may have been able to track down Newton with a simple Google search.
He appears in an article in 1994, when a coroner ruled out foul play after a woman called Caroline Mayorcas fell 900ft to her death while climbing the Eiger in Switzerland with her partner, Hann Redwin.
At the inquest, it emerged that Redwin was, in fact, Newton, and was living at that time in Chiswick, west London.
Redwin has also been a contributor to a journal for weather satellite enthusiasts and appeared in Pilot magazine as late as 2015.
Gwent police explained on Monday that it interviewed Meighan during Operation Velum and submitted a file to the CPS but no further action was taken and the investigation was closed.
It said after officers realised Newton was alive, they spoke to him but he had not provided any fresh information.
A spokesperson said: “As Mr Redwin’s [historical] evidence has already been considered by the CPS prior to this matter being closed, Gwent police is satisfied that there is no basis to re-refer the matter to the CPS and the investigation remains closed.”
“Gwent police would like to clarify that at no point has it reopened the original Jeremy Thorpe investigation. Operation Velum was specifically about claims made by Dennis Meighan of police corruption relating to the Thorpe inquiry. The two inquiries are linked but are separate investigations.”