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Mountbatten’s paedophile abuse: letter from definitive biographer
Andrew Lownie not published by Sunday Independent
By Andrew Lownie.
A few weeks ago the Irish Times ran an article on the death of Mountbatten linked to the new series of The Crown in which the murder features in the opening episode.
As the author of the most recent biography ‘The Mountbattens: Their Lives and Loves’, I was interviewed for the piece on the discrepancies between the reality and the drama, telling the paper the programme left out “some significant details about the killing, most notably that Mountbatten had ignored the advice of his personal security officer not to go to Ireland that year and that his security had been reduced”.
The paper then raised some of the other discoveries from my book namely the FBI file which revealed Mountbatten as a “homosexual with a perversion for young boys” and my interview with two men, one of them from the Kincora Boys Home, who claimed to have been abused by him in the summer of 1977 . In passing, I mentioned there were rumours that Mountbatten had not been killed for political reasons but because of his paedophile activities.
The article ended with references to my problems securing the release of the car logs for Classiebawn for August 1977 and the continuing closure of papers relating to the murder and also the Kincora Boys Home in archives in Britain and Ireland . Some 40 years after Mountbatten’s death, there were details the authorities clearly did not want the public to know.
Shortly afterwards Colin Armstrong popped up in the letters page of the Sunday Independent suggesting, as he has done in previous similar letters to papers, that the abuse could not have happened because no one reported it. A former staff member at Classiebawn joined in the debate saying no-one at Classiebawn had seen anything and my assertions were pure fiction.
This followed comments from Jeffrey Dudgeon that my interviewees were fantasists like Carl Beech and inferring that as they hadn’t appeared at the Hart enquiry they couldn’t be legitimate, and a story in the Sligo Champion/Weekender of “ignoring the facts”. In all this coverage, no journalist asked me to respond.
I was quite happy to defend my research and contacted various journalists at the Irish Times, Sunday Independent and Sligo Weekender. No response. When I chased, I was told the story had moved on – after five days.
So to set the record straight here is the letter I sent:
Dear Sir,
It is natural and admirable that John Barry should seek to defend Lord Mountbatten, who employed him, his mother and brother but, just because Mountbatten’s ‘family, friends, staff and local staff’ saw no paedophile activity, it does not mean that it did not happen. By its very nature such proclivities are kept private. In fact my research shows that only one member of staff was well aware what was happening but chose to remain silent.
If he reads my book ‘The Mountbattens: Their Lives and Loves’, rather than dismiss my findings as “implausible fictional claims” , he will see I have produced extensive evidence to back up my claims of Mountbatten’s paedophilia.
Stories about Mountbatten’s proclivities have circulated in the media for over forty years including accounts in Private Eye and the International Times where the newspaper proprietor Cecil King described Mountbatten as a “sexual pervert”. There was also a report in Now Magazine in 1990 where the Northern Ireland author Robin Bryans claimed that “leading British establishment figures were in a vice ring which abused boys from the notorious Kincora Home in East Belfast” and named Mountbatten as one of them. It also reported that Mountbatten “was particularly attracted to boys in their early teens”. Bryans in private correspondence, which I have seen, wrote that “Kincora and Portora Boys’ Schools were used as homosexual brothels by many prominent figures, including Lord Mountbatten”. Joseph de Burca in Village Magazine has written extensively about Mountbatten’s paedophile networks.
In my book I reproduce FBI files going back to 1944 with interviews with people in Mountbatten’s circle . One, the American writer and society figure, Baroness Decies, when interviewed on another matter reported ‘that Lord Louis Mountbatten was known to be a homosexual with a perversion for young boys’. Interestingly I was told that other FBI files I had requested under Freedom of Information legislation had been destroyed – after I requested them.
Mountbatten’s wartime driver Norman Nield is on record saying he “was ordered to take young boys who had been procured for the admiral to his official residence in Lord Mountbatten’s Humber car” . According to Nield, Mountbatten, known as LL, used brandy and lemonade to help seduce the boys, who ranged in age from 8 to 12.
I interviewed two boys who said they were abused by Mountbatten. Knowing of the controversy their testimony would generate, I was particularly keen to ensure what they said was true. Everything I could check was found to be accurate but clearly these were recollections over forty years after the event. One boy was abused in Classiebawn’s boathouse, away from the house, another in a local hotel where before the days of cctv it was very easy for a visitor to nip briefly upstairs. I have never suggested that boys stayed at Classiebawn castle itself let alone overnight.
Contrary to claims, one has gone public with his claims and has brought legal action which is almost concluded. I am hoping he will shortly appear in a television programme on Mountbatten.
Likewise my interviewee had agreed to participate in the HIA Inquiry but the Inquiry served several hundred pages of information on his solicitors just before the weekend prior to his appearance at the Inquiry. His solicitors rightly told the Inquiry that, in the time allowed, it was impossible for them to read and study all the documents, let alone advise him properly.
In ‘The Mountbattens’, I reveal that Mountbatten was probably himself abused as a teenager by a bachelor clergyman Frederick Lawrence Long who acted as a private tutor.
On legal advice, some material was removed from my book , referring to Mountbatten’s paedophilia and murder, which further supported my paedophilia claims. I hope at some stage that material can be restored.
Various people have contacted me since my book was published last year providing fresh evidence of Mountbatten’s activities and I also hope to incorporate that testimony in future editions.
One has to ask why so many files from Kincora still remain closed after all this time, why files scheduled for release several years ago are still held by government departments and were not supplied to the relevant abuse inquiries and why the Garda have refused to supply the car logs for Classiebawn for August 1977 when the boys were abused. Why not? What is there to hide?
Many files on Mountbatten’s murder remain closed forty years later and questions remain. Why was his security reduced in 1979 and his boat no longer watched when it was known there was an enhanced threat that year and there had been recent attempts on his life, including an attempt to place a bomb on Shadow V? Why was the bodyguard Graham Yuill’s security audit warning of threats in July 1979 ignored and he quickly reposted to Hong Kong? Might it be possible, for whatever reason, that Mountbatten did not want too much security?
For years friends, family and staff claimed Mountbatten was not bisexual. My book, drawing on dozens of sources, shows that was not true. I fear the same campaign by supporters is being mounted again on another issue trying to smear Mountbatten’s two brave victims with the Carl Beech brush. I have always dismissed Beech as either a complete fantasist or someone who received a large amount of money to invent his absurd stories to discredit genuine survivors of sex abuse. It is now well known that Beech had massive funds available to him, far more than he could have earned or saved.
I am a Cambridge-trained historian who follows the evidence and stand by what I have written.
Yours sincerely, Dr Andrew Lownie
Ex-Mossad chief ‘leaked’ classified info to married lover
20 Dec, 2021 12:34
June 25, 2019. © Reuters / Corinna Kern
Former Mossad head Yossi Cohen leaked state secrets, including info on the spy agency’s operations, to a flight attendant with whom he was having an affair, as well as her husband, according to an Israeli television report.
The alleged affair began in late 2018 and saw Cohen boast to the couple about a variety of secret details relating to Mossad activities. He also disclosed information about his travels and management style, a Channel 13 program reported.
In the program, which will be broadcast on Tuesday, the attendant’s husband, Guy Shiker, said Cohen would refer to the unidentified woman as “my princess” and “my beauty” in messages. “You love my wife, she loves you, you’re destroying a family right now,” Shiker added.
He told lots of stories, including about Mossad.
He’s a blabbermouth. He started telling me that Mossad
was ‘sitting’ on a doctor of a well-known Arab leader.
Shiker, a prominent financier, told the program that Cohen bragged about how he apparently “fired six [top Mossad officials with whom he was friends]... without mercy” within “10 days” of being appointed as the country’s top spy “because they weren’t loyal to the system” and “weren’t good.”
In response, Cohen countered that he never revealed any security secrets or gave out any information he was not supposed to share. It is unclear as yet whether he denies or acknowledges that there had been an affair.
The network had reported in June that the country’s attorney general was reviewing a complaint filed with the Justice Ministry against Cohen on suspicion of sharing classified information with a flight attendant with whom he was in close personal contact.
At the time, Cohen had denied the allegations outright, telling the channel there was “no flight attendant, there is no close relationship [and that] the attorney general has not contacted me” about the complaint.
The former spymaster’s apparent loose tongue had previously seen him criticized for an interview in which he confirmed that Mossad had its sights on assassinating Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, and detailed how the agency blew up Iran’s centrifuge facility at Natanz.
Since leaving the agency in June, Cohen has also faced several accusations of ethics violations and has admitted to accepting a gift illegally.
FIFTH woman accuses Sex and the City star Chris Noth
of sexual assault
Singer-songwriter Lisa Gentile says Noth forced himself on her and groped her breasts
in 2002, then threatened to ruin her if she told anyone
By MELISSA KOENIG FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 14:40 EST, 23 December 2021 |
A fifth woman came forward on Thursday to accuse Sex and the City actor Chris Noth of sexual abuse.
Lisa Gentile claims she was 'sexually abused' by the actor in 2002 when she worked as a singer and songwriter.
Gentile said she met Noth when she frequented Don Marino's restaurant back in the early 2000s, and the two became acquaintances.
He then squeezed her breasts she said, before sliding his hands under his (her?) shirt.
'I kept pushing his hands down, as he pulled my shirt up,' she said in a statement on Thursday, claiming he then pulled her hand towards his penis.
She said, she cannot bring a suit against the actor, however, as the statute of limitations has expired.
'The courthouse door is slammed shut in her face,' attorney Gloria Allred said in a news conference, urging for the passage of the Adult Survivors Act, which would allow women to bring lawsuits against their former abusers.
She asked Noth's costars on Sex and the City to support the legislation, which would allow Gentile to bring a case against him.
Four other women have previously accused the Sex and the City actor of sexual assault, with two women, using the pseudonyms Zoe, now 40, and Lily, now 31 telling the Hollywood Reporter on December 17 that the actor raped them.
Both of those accusers in the report claimed that Noth had sex with them from behind in front of a mirror, with the first attack allegedly taking place in 2004, while the second reportedly occurred in 2015, three years after Noth married his wife, Tara Wilson, with whom he has two children.
The two women both also allege that the attacks took place in one of Noth's homes - the first in his Los Angeles apartment and the second in his New York City property - after the actor invited them over.
Both women claim that the recent publicity surrounding the Sex and the City reboot - And Just Like That - 'stirred painful memories' of their encounters with Noth, who has featured heavily in the news in the past week as a result of the shock death of his character, Mr. Big, in the first episode of the new series.
One of the accusers - using the pseudonym Zoe - said she first met Noth while working 'in an entry-level position at a high-profile firm where Noth and other celebrities regularly had business' in 2004.
She claims that the actor - who was then at the height of his Sex and the City fame and, according to Zoe's then-boss was seen as a 'god' by her and colleagues - began flirting with her in the office.
There is much, much more on this story at the Daily Mail.
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Manchester City defender Mendy charged with seventh rape
Former France international Mendy appeared at Chester Crown Court in the UK on Thursday, when the lifting of restrictions allowed the emergence of a further rape charge to be revealed against the 27-year-old.
The charge comes in addition to six counts of rape and one of sexual assault which Mendy has already been charged with.
Mendy stands accused of a total of eight offenses against five different women, with the rape charges concerning four women.
Three of the alleged crimes took place on October 11 2020, with one on January 2 2021, one on July 24 2021 and two on August 23 2021.
Mendy's co-defendant Louis Saha Matturie, appeared alongside him at the hearing. Matturie, of Greater Manchester, is accused of serious sex offences against young women.
Forty-year-old Matturie was said to have worn a tie in the dock, while Mendy did not.
Former Monaco star Mendy, of Cheshire, has been in custody since he was arrested on August 26. The pair were remanded in custody at HMP Altcourse in Liverpool following the 40-minute hearing.
Their trial had been set for January but has now been rescheduled for June 27 or August 1 2022. Judge Patrick Thompson said that a hearing on January 7 will deal with custody time and bail arrangements.
A plea and trial preparation hearing is then expected to take place on January 24.
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