{"id":626318,"date":"2026-08-08T01:33:23","date_gmt":"2026-08-08T01:33:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/626318\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T01:33:23","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T01:33:23","slug":"uk-terror-police-investigating-ann-widdecombes-death-reopen-old-investigation-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/626318\/","title":{"rendered":"UK terror police investigating Ann Widdecombe\u2019s death reopen old investigation \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

UK<\/a> counter-terror police investigating the death of former MP Ann Widdecombe<\/a> have reopened an old investigation into an attempted burglary last year.<\/p>\n

The incident at an address in Greater London<\/a> was reported in April 2025.<\/p>\n

The Metropolitan Police<\/a> and Counter Terrorism Policing (CTP) London investigated but no arrests were made and the case was closed pending any new lines of inquiry.<\/p>\n

Since it was reopened, CTP London has identified a line of inquiry \u201cwhich may have been relevant\u201d but was \u201cnot identified and pursued by them at the time\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) is now investigating the \u201cconduct\u201d of a CTP London staff member, following an allegation that the employee \u201cfailed to identify and pursue a line of inquiry\u201d related to the attempted burglary.<\/p>\n

Reform UK<\/a> spokeswoman and former Tory<\/a> minister Widdecombe (78) died on July 8th after she was hit over the head with a hammer 21 times at her home in Haytor on Dartmoor, Devon.<\/p>\n

Joshua Kerry (28) was charged with her murder on July 20th.<\/p>\n

Senior national co-ordinator for CTP, Vicki Evans, said: \u201cAs part of the ongoing investigation led by Counter Terrorism Policing South East into the murder of Ann Widdecombe, officers have reopened an investigation into an incident reported to police last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe added: \u201cGiven the nature of this matter and the significant public interest in the investigation into Ann Widdecombe\u2019s death, it was of critical importance for us to provide this update.\u201d<\/p>\n

CTP London made a \u201cmandatory conduct referral\u201d to the IOPC on Friday.<\/p>\n

An IOPC spokesperson said: \u201cWe can confirm that the IOPC has decided to independently investigate the conduct of a Counter Terrorism Policing London staff member following a referral received earlier today.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conduct relates to an allegation the individual failed to identify and pursue a line of enquiry relating to an attempted burglary reported in April 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cCounter Terrorism Policing London has been notified of our decision, and no further information is available at this early stage.\u201d \u2013 PA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK counter-terror police investigating the death of former MP Ann Widdecombe have reopened an old investigation into an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":626319,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[246308,9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,130,15,16,36124,5,20566,7,8,20565,393],"class_list":["post-626318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-ann-widdecombe","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-eire","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-headlines","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-london","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-metropolitan-police","tag-news","tag-reform-uk","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-uk-politics","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117057316751844071","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/626319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}