Damian Green accuses former terror cop of trying to frame him over computer porn claim
2 min read
Theresa May's closest Cabinet ally has accused a former counter-terror police officer of trying to frame him over claims "extreme" pornography was found on his work computer.
Damian Green, the First Secretary of State and de facto deputy Prime Minister, insisted the allegations - made by Bob Quick in the Sunday Times - were "completely untrue".
Mr Quick, a former assistant commissioner at the Metropolitan Police, said the material was discovered when Mr Green's Commons office was raided in 2008.
In a statement initially prepared for the Leveson Inquiry into media behaviour, Mr Quick - who was forced to quit in 2009 over a security leak - said that if similar material had been found on a police officer’s computer, it could result in "gross misconduct" charges and "dismissal".
The former senior officer is due to give evidence tomorrow to an inquiry into Mr Green being carried out by Sue Gray, Whitehall’s head of propriety and ethics.
That follows separate accusations by a female journalist that the senior Tory behaved inappropriately towards her - claims he strenuously denies.
Mr Green's parliamentary office was raided and his computer seized in November, 2008, over a series of leaks from the Home Office which proved damaging to the then Labour government.
In a statement posted on Twitter last night, Mr Green said of the Sunday Time article: "This story is completely untrue and comes from a tainted and untrustworthy source.
"I've been aware for some years that the discredited former Assistant Commissioner Bob Quick has tried to cause me political damage by leaking false information about the raid on my parliamentary office. No newspaper has printed this information due to the complete lack of any evidence.
"It is well-known that Quick, whi was forced to apologise for alleging that the Conservative Party was trying to undermine him, harbours deep resentment about his press treatment during the time of my investigation. More improtantly, the police have never suggested that improper material was found on my parliamentary computer, nor did I have a 'private' computer as has been claimed.
"The allegations about the material and computer, now 9 years old, are false, disreputable political smears from a discredited police officer acting in flagrant breach of his duty to keep the details of police investigations confidential and amount to little more than an unscrupulous character assassination."
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