Scotsman : Britain today: Spy 'could have died during sex game'

Britain today: Spy 'could have died during sex game'

August 27, 2010

The private life of British code breaker Gareth Williams, who was found dead in his flat, is being investigated amid speculation that he could have died during a sex game.

There were reports today that bondage gear was removed from the 30-year-old's London apartment by police looking for clues.

Wales Online : Police believe spy knew his killer

Police believe spy knew his killer

Western Mail | August 27, 2010

THE family of a Welsh spy, whose murder at his London flat remains shrouded in mystery, hit out last night at allegations about his private life.

Detectives investigating the murder of 30-year-old Gareth Williams were picking over details of his life last night for clues that could identify his killer.

The code expert’s decomposing body was found stuffed into a bag in the bath of his government flat.

He was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of MI6 from his job at national “listening post” GCHQ in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. Further tests were taking place to determine how the cycling and fitness fanatic met his death after a post-mortem examination was inconclusive.

A pathologist found Mr Williams had not been stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation.

Police are refusing to categorise the case as a murder inquiry, despite the bizarre circumstances, as they insist he may have died innocently.

One line of inquiry is reportedly that he is the victim of a sex game that went wrong and questions remain over why he was not discovered sooner.

Police believe Mr Williams’ body could have lain undiscovered for up to a fortnight and it is thought he was on holiday at the time of his death.

They believe the key to the case could lie in his private life.

But his uncle, William Hughes, said suggestions reported in London newspapers that the GCHQ and MI6 officer was gay and a transvestite had deeply upset his parents, Ian and Elen, from Valley on Anglesey.

The couple were still too upset to speak of their son’s death yesterday.

But 62-year-old Mr Hughes said: “They’re devastated. That is the worst part of it [the allegations about his private life].

“Terrible accusations have been made and there’s no truth whatsoever in them. They just need to be left alone and given space.”

Mr Hughes said Mr Williams’ parents remained in the dark as to whether his death was linked to his security services work or his personal life. Mr Williams has been described as an extremely private person.

Investigators suspect he might have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat in smart Alderney Street, Pimlico.

Police have begun examining his mobile phone and financial records as well as CCTV cameras from streets and businesses surrounding his home.

His home has been the subject of a fingertip search amid fears that top-secret work material could have gone missing.

Mr Williams’ parents travelled to London with his sister Ceri, who lives near Wrexham, yesterday to speak to police and formally identify his body.

Mr Hughes said they were deeply shocked and flew back from a holiday in North America after learning of his death.

He said: “The last time I saw Gareth was just a few months ago at a family party and he was fine.

“He was always a quiet person, he was from a young age. But this is a close family and we all see each other quite regularly at family occasions.”

He said he never knew Mr Williams to bring home a girlfriend or a partner, describing him as a “very, very private person”.

“It’s a long way from Anglesey to Cheltenham and London. When he came home, he brought his bicycle. He enjoyed cycling around the island,” he said.

“I knew he worked at GCHQ and he had been working in London but I didn’t know what he did. It wasn’t said that we shouldn’t talk about it, I simply never asked and he never told me.

“He was a bright boy from a young age and his parents were very proud of him.”

Officers broke down the door of Mr Williams’ home on Monday afternoon when attempts by government officials to locate him via his former landlady failed.

Investigators from the Metropolitan Police’s homicide and serious crime command labelled the death as “suspicious and unexplained”.

Former landlady Jenny Elliott said the victim lived in a flat attached to her Cheltenham property for 10 years and was preparing to return on September 3.

“He phoned me a few weeks ago to say he was coming back,” she said.

She described him as “a lovely guy, very friendly, very well-mannered and polite and no trouble at all”.

She added: “He was often away. He went to America to work a lot and often combined it with holiday because he hated flying.”

Mr Williams’ London neighbours described him as “extremely friendly”, athletic and a keen cyclist.

He joined Cambridge University’s St Catharine’s College to undertake a postgraduate certificate in mathematics in 2000, but dropped out a year later.

Sources close to the inquiry said it was not clear how he died and played down speculation that the murder was linked to his secretive line of work.

One source said: “The suggestion there is terrorism or national security links to this case is pretty low down the list of probabilities.”

The Alderney Street flat is about half-a-mile from the riverside headquarters of MI6, the Secret Intelligence Service.

A childhood friend of Mr Williams described him as academically gifted but socially naive.

Dylan Parry, 34, said the GCHQ codes and cyphers expert was an isolated child fascinated by mathematics and computers.

Mr Parry, a volunteer at Westminster Cathedral, went to school with Mr Williams at Uwchradd Bodedern secondary.

He said Mr Williams travelled to Bangor University every week aged 16 to study for a mathematics degree part time. He graduated with a first class mathematics degree from Bangor aged 19.

He said: “It was clear he was going to go far, but we all assumed he would end up in academia.

“Finding out he became a spy was a shock.”

He graduated with a first class mathematics degree from Bangor University aged 19.

He continued his studies with an elite course at St Catharine’s College but dropped out.

The university is one of the traditional hunting grounds for recruiters looking for bright young things to join the intelligence community.

Ronald Jones, 86, who lives with his wife Eileen, a few doors away from the Williams family on Anglesey, said: “The whole family keep to themselves very much.

“We’ve never had a discussion with them.

“I don’t remember ever seeing Gareth’s mother but the father runs every day.

“They’ve lived here for about 18 years.”

Mrs Jones, 85, said: “They were polite and always greeted you but further than that I don’t think they bothered with anyone.”

One neighbour, who asked not to be named, described the family as “really lovely people”.

Keith Thompson, of Holyhead Cycling Club, said he had known Mr Williams since he joined the club at the age of 17.

He said: “I heard the news in a text message yesterday morning and it was a shock.

“We are a small club, only 20 members, and all of us knew Gareth.

“We are totally devastated. He was a really lovely young man.

“Of course, once he moved to Cheltenham, he joined the club there and we didn’t see much of him.

“I last saw him on our Boxing Day meeting last year.

“He was his usual self really.

“It’s true that he was very quiet. He wasn’t a great conversationalist.

“We were club mates but Gareth wasn’t the sort to go the pub after a race so he didn’t have any close friends in the group.

“I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did with Gareth.

“It was his cycling that we knew about. He was known for being very good on hill races but a couple of times he won the club’s best all-rounder award.

“He was also a good runner but that was to be expected, his whole family is very sporty.

“His father was a member of this club and Ceri was an athlete. We’ll be getting in touch to offer our condolences when they are home.

“We have also cancelled a club event we had planned for tonight. Nobody feels up to it now.”

Daily Mail : CIA probes British spy murder as it emerges he was sent on frequent missions to Pentagon's high-security listening post

CIA probes British spy murder as it emerges he was sent on frequent missions to Pentagon's high-security listening post

By Charlotte Gill, Emily Andrews and Liz Hull | August 27, 2010

The CIA was called in to help investigate the murder of an MI6 spy last night as it emerged he was sent on frequent secret missions to the United States.

American intelligence officers are poring over every detail of Gareth Williams's work and personal life to see if the circumstances of his death endangered U.S. national security.

The Daily Mail can reveal that the 31-year-old codebreaker flew to the National Security Agency, the Pentagon's listening post and the largest intelligence agency in the world, up to four times a year. He returned from his last trip to America only a few weeks before he was found dead.

Questions also remain over why his body lay undiscovered for up to a fortnight at his £400,000 flat in a Victorian townhouse in Pimlico, central London, half a mile from MI6 headquarters.

Mr Williams worked at the Government's listening post, GCHQ in Cheltenham, but had been on secondment to MI6 for the past year and was due to return to GCHQ next Friday.

The body of the keen cyclist was found in a sports holdall in the bath on Monday afternoon.

But yesterday his former landlady in Cheltenham insisted he had not been off work, intensifying the mystery surrounding his death.

Security sources could not explain why some one holding such a sensitive post was able to go 'missing' for such a long time before police were called.

Officers were last night examining the hard drive of a laptop computer found in the flat.

Landlady Jenny Elliott said: 'He definitely wasn't on annual leave as the security services woman who came to see me after they found his body told me that he wasn't on holiday.

'Why did no one notice? It's disgraceful the police weren't alerted earlier that he was missing. His murder is devastating and I just hope the person who did it is caught.

Mrs Elliott, 71, who rented Mr Williams a self-contained flat attached to her home in Cheltenham, said he would often travel to America for weeks at a time three or four times a year either with a male colleague or on his own.

His uncle, who lives in Anglesey, North Wales, where Mr Williams grew up, said: 'He'd been making the trips for a couple of years.

'I only found this out very recently and I do not know where in America he was staying or who he was working for out there, but I do know it was in relation to his job.

'His last trip was this summer. He returned from the States just a couple of weeks or so before he died.'

A U.S. intelligence source said there was 'no panic' yet within the National Security Agency and people who knew Mr Williams were still to be questioned.

The source said: 'The strong implication is that his death is not connected to his intelligence work, though this could change at any time. They are understandably concerned about what has happened and are keeping a close eye on developments.'

Mr Williams's devastated parents Ian and Ellen have faced speculation over their son's private life.

It has been reported that Mr Williams, who lived alone and did not have a partner, was a gay cross dresser and may have been killed by a gay lover.

Police sources believe another theory is the spy's killer may have planted a trail of clues to make it seem as though he was murdered by a gay lover.

They said gay magazines and the phone numbers of gay escort men were found in the apartment near the agent's body.

Police have also asked a pathologist to check whether Mr Williams's neck was broken, which would suggest a professional hit, the sources said.

Those who know him say there is nothing to suggest that he may have been homosexual.

Mrs Elliott, who rented her flat to him for ten years during his time at GCHQ, never saw him bring anyone – male or female – back to his home.

Detectives are still trying to ascertainhow Mr Williams died. A postmortem examination proved inconclusive and now they must wait for toxicology results to find out whether drugs, alcohol, poisoning or suffocation were the cause of death.

Sources say he was not stabbed, shot, strangled or beaten. Scotland Yard is describing the death as 'suspicious and unexplained'.

A former MI6 officer said that intelligence chiefs are furious that details of Mr Williams's work as a spy had been leaked.

Harry Ferguson said senior officials at the Secret Intelligence Service wanted to suppress any information about his work and to simply refer to him as a 'civil servant' when news of the murder was made public.

'They hoped details of his role could all be kept covered up. It is a standard process. Blurting it out has caused a lot of unnecessary embarrassment, risk and upheaval to the SIS.

'If it had been managed properly it could have been kept quiet. He could simply have been described as a government worker or civil servant.

'They are especially frustrated that it has emerged that not only was he was working in GCHQ, but also on secondment to MI6.'

Mr Ferguson said secret service bosses feared that the 'nightmare scenario' had come true when the body was discovered.

'One of the concerns about having such a high profile building as the SIS does is that, while staff can be protected when inside the building, there a significant risk that they could be followed home,' he said.

'It is the sort of thing that a small group of Islamists or other terror network would clearly be capable of doing.'

He said the apparent 'ritualistic' scene at Mr Williams' flat, with his mobile phone and SIM cards carefully laid out, also suggested it could have been carried out by a foreign agency to send a message.

The reclusive maths genius and rumours of cross-dressing and blackmail

FROM a tender age, it was clear to his teachers at Morswyn primary school on Anglesey that there was something special about Gareth Williams.

A talented pupil, he was fast-tracked through education, earning his maths GCSE aged nine while most of his contemporaries were still grappling with basic arithmetic.

By 13 he had secured his A-levels and had a degree in maths by 17.

He was known as ‘the maths genius’ by fellow pupils and possessed the ‘fastest brain’ his teachers had encountered. But his academic excellence came at a price.

Forced to study with children several years older than himself, he found it hard to make friends and was last night described by former school mates as ‘socially naive’ and ‘introverted’.

Detectives were last night investigating whether this shy, private side to his nature made him vulnerable to blackmail amid lurid claims that he was a secret cross-dresser.

Geraint Williams, his maths teacher at secondary school, recalled how young Gareth was so clever that he sat his intermediate maths GCSE, gaining a grade B, while still at primary school, before being moved up to Bodedern Secondary School, Holyhead, a year ahead of his peers.

Within months of his arrival he took his advanced GCSE, scoring an A grade, and received top marks in A-level maths and computer studies two years later, when he was 13.

His teachers were initially at a loss at how best to educate him. Their solution was to move him up two years and enrol the youngster, then aged 15, on a three-year maths degree course at his local university at Bangor, which he attained in just two years with first class honours.

Teacher Mr Williams said: ‘I’d heard about this amazing pupil who had done his GCSE at primary school and got a B at intermediate level.

‘He took the higher level GCSE in a couple of months and got an A. It was a problem for us – what could we do with him? We got him to follow A-levels and he did A-level maths and computer science in the third-form. He achieved As in them.

‘That was a big problem because he was still only 13, so we contacted Bangor University and he followed the first year of maths degree course.’

The teacher added: ‘He was the best logician and the pupil with the fastest brain I have ever met. You only had to say things once, that’s why he was so successful. He could understand things immediately. He was also extremely good with computer science.

‘Gareth was also a very nice lad, quiet and unassuming. It’s very sad.’

After leaving Bangor University at 17, Mr Williams went on to study for a PhD at Manchester University before enrolling in postgraduate certificate at St Catharine’s College, Cambridge, in 2000.

He dropped out a year later, but last night friends speculated that he left after being taken on by the Secret Services, which traditionally recruit from Oxbridge.

They said it was an open secret that Mr Williams worked at GCHQ, but added that any notion that the quiet, unassuming boy lead a James Bond spy lifestyle was laughable.

One close friend, who attended primary school with Mr Williams, said: ‘Gareth was a super, super brain. Beyond intelligent, a very, very clever guy.

‘He was hand-picked while at Cambridge by the services, they want the cream of the crop and he certainly was that.

‘It was common knowledge that he worked at GCHQ, but any notion that he led a James Bond style lifestyle is rubbish.

‘Those kind of people have to be able to blend in, but Gareth wasn’t like that, he was very different.

‘He was introverted and found it difficult to make friends, but he was a lovely, lovely bloke. It is such a tragic waste of such a talented life.’

The dead man’s parents, Ian, an engineer at Wylfa power station, and mother Ellen, who worked in education, were on holiday in America celebrating their joint 50th birthdays when news of their son’s death broke.Last night they were said to be ‘devastated’.

Another former school friend, Dylan Parry, 34, said he was ‘dumfounded’ by the murder.

‘Gareth was the last person I would have believed would be involved in the murkier elements of life,’ said Mr Parry, of Holyhead. ‘He really was about as far from a James Bond figure as it’s possible to imagine.

‘Gareth was introverted and socially awkward. He wasn’t dashing or cavalier or a charmer, although he was extremely nice in a quiet way.

‘There has been a lot of speculation about his sexuality, but he was so introverted as to be asexual.‘

He wasn’t able to form relationships because he was so obsessed with his maths studies.

‘We nicknamed him the maths genius because he was so clever. He was so naive, he was someone people could easily take advantage of.

‘I wouldn’t have thought he was a very good judge of character and it’s possible he got to know someone who wasn’t very safe. He was so innocent.’

Daily Post : Cyclists recall talents of murdered Holyhead spy Gareth Williams

Cyclists recall talents of murdered Holyhead spy Gareth Williams

by Deborah James, Daily Post | August 27, 2010

FELLOW cyclists paid tribute to codebreaker Gareth Williams for his skills on two wheels.

Mr Williams, 30, was a talented rider who regularly took part in road races and time trials. He was a former member of Holyhead Cycling Club and belonged to Cheltenham and County Cycling Club.

Records show he took part in cycling races in Snowdonia last September, and on Anglesey in September and on Valentine’s Day this year.

Speaking of their shock at learning of his suspicious death, friends from the cycling community described him as a “maths genius” who came across as “a very nice, friendly and quiet chap”.

Keith Thompson, of Holyhead Cycling Club, said he’d known Mr Williams since he joined the club aged of 17. He had won a trophy for being the Anglesey club’s junior best all rounder in 1996 and was named senior best all rounder from 1997 to 2000.

“I heard the news in a text message and it was a shock,” said Mr Thompson. “We are a small club, only 20 members, and all of us knew Gareth. We are totally devastated. He was a really lovely young man.

“Of course, once he moved to Cheltenham he joined the club there and we didn’t see much of him. I last saw him on our Boxing Day meeting last year. He was his usual self. It’s true that he was very quiet. He wasn’t a great conversationalist.

“We were club mates but Gareth wasn’t the sort to go to the pub after a race so he didn’t have any close friends in the group. I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did.

“It was his cycling that we knew about. He was known for being very good on hill races. He was also a good runner, his whole family is very sporty. His father was a member of this club and (sister) Ceri was an athlete.

“We’ll be getting in touch to offer our condolences when they are home. We have also cancelled a club event we had planned for tonight. Nobody feels up to it now.”

David Hughes, from Clwb Rasio Mona, said: “As neighbouring clubs, we used to come across each other all the time. Although I didn’t know him personally, he was known around the cycling scene as a lovely person. He was a fine sportsman.”

While studying an advanced maths course at Cambridge in 2000, he joined the university cycling club and became the team’s “star rider”. Friends who raced alongside him left messages on the VeloRiders internet forum. One wrote: “He was a maths genius... People sometimes thought he was dense because he spoke rather slowly and sometimes seemed distracted. How wrong can you get?

A fellow Cambridge student called Tim said: “He seemed a shy and quiet chap, but had a peculiarly memorable laugh and smile that are haunting me somewhat today.”

The Australian : Slain spy Gareth Williams linked to bondage, male escort

Slain spy Gareth Williams linked to bondage, male escort

Staff writers | From: The Times | August 27, 2010

POLICE investigating the murder of a British spy found bondage equipment in his flat and evidence linking him to a male escort.

The find has raised questions over how Gareth Williams's private life slipped through the vetting procedures of the security services. Senior security personnel are said to be "extremely concerned" that an employee with high clearance had a lifestyle that put him in danger of being compromised.

A source close to the investigation said that evidence discovered in the London flat included bondage items, porn films and paraphernalia associated with sado-masochism. It is also understood that Mr Williams, who was on secondment to M16 from GCHQ, the Government's top secret listening post, has been linked to a male escort.

Detectives have focused their investigations on the private life of Mr Williams, 30, since he was found on Monday murdered and stuffed into a holdall in his flat in Pimlico, a short walk from M16 headquarters.

It also emerged that Mr Williams travelled regularly to the United States on official business, raising further concerns about potential national security breaches because of the information he had access to. He went to Washington several times a year, stayed for a few weeks each time and went shortly before he died.

Last night the National Security Agency refused to confirm or deny that Mr Williams, who is believed to be an expert in codes and ciphers, had worked for them. It is not unusual for members of the security services to spend time working for government security departments in America.

Jenny Elliott, the spy's former landlady in Cheltenham, said Mr Williams regularly travelled to America. "He would go to Washington about three times a year. It was always Washington. That was part of his job." She said that Mr Williams would usually combine the trip with a holiday.

Detectives from the Homicide and Serious Crime Command may have to wait for up to a week to find out how Mr Williams died. The initial postmortem examination proved inconclusive and several tests, thought to include toxicology tests, are now being conducted.

A picture of Mr Williams as a genius who led a solitary existence began to emerge yesterday. Friends described him as athletic, kind and intelligent, but above all extremely private. Dylan Parry, a schoolfriend, described him as academically gifted but socially naive. Mr Parry, 34, said Mr Williams was an isolated child fascinated by mathematics and computers.

The pair attended Uwchradd Bodedern secondary in Anglesey, where Mr Williams was "the kind of person who found it difficult to engage with people on a normal level".

"It was clear he was going to go far, but we all assumed he would end up in academia. Finding out he became a spy was a shock," Mr Parry said.

Geraint Williams, the spy's maths teacher at Bodedern, said he had "definitely the best brain" he had known. "If you explained something once to Gareth he remembered it. You didn't have to explain a second time. It all stuck there. It didn't surprise me at all that he was very interested in codes and ciphers and it didn't surprise me that he was recruited by GCHQ."

Online tributes mainly referred to his shy and quiet nature. One fellow Cambridge student, said: "He seemed a shy and quiet chap, but had a peculiarly memorable laugh and smile that are haunting me somewhat today. I knew that Gareth had gone on to work at Cheltenham but would never have imagined his life culminating in this."

Keith Thompson, of Holyhead Cycling Club, said he had known Mr Williams since he joined the club at the age of 17. "It's true that he was very quiet. He wasn't a great conversationalist. We were clubmates but Gareth wasn't the sort to go the pub after a race so he didn't have any close friends in the group. I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did with Gareth. It was his cycling that we knew about. A couple of times he won the club's 'best all-rounder' award."

Times of Malta : Tributes paid to murdered spy

Tributes paid to murdered spy

Espionage

PA | August 27, 2010

The picture emerging of Gareth Williams could be that of a textbook spy: athletic, intelligent and private.

Detectives investigating the murder of a British spy were picking over his private life yesterday for clues that could identify his killer.

The decomposing body of codes expert Gareth Williams, 30, was found stuffed into a bag in the bath of his London government flat.

He was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of MI6 from his job at national “listening post” GCHQ in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

Originally from Wales, he studied at Cambridge University – one of the traditional recruiting grounds for the British secret services.

He excelled at maths, embarking on a postgraduate certificate at St Catharine’s college in 2000.

But he dropped out after a year and began a career working for the secret services.

Relative William Hughes said he worked for GCHQ, the government’s so-called listening post, for “many years”.

But he kept quiet regarding the actual nature of his work.

“He would never talk about it and it felt rude to ask,” Mr Hughes told the BBC.

Jenny Elliott, his former landlady in Cheltenham, described Mr Williams as “a lovely guy”. She added that during his time living in Cheltenham he was often sent overseas, spending much of this time in America.

Residents close to his London address said Mr Williams was “extremely friendly”. A keen cyclist, Mr Williams competed in races in Cheltenham, and was described by those who knew him as extremely fit.

A fellow member of the Cheltenham & Country Cycle Club told The Times: “He turned up at events, rode very well and then went on his way. He never took part in any of our more social rides.”

One London neighbour also attested to his private nature. Secretary Laura Houghton, 30, said Mr William’s windows were always shut with the curtains drawn. “I could never tell if anyone was in,” she added.

Believed to be single, his former landlady said Mr Williams rarely entertained and did not have a wide circle of friends.

Mirror : THE U.S. CONNECTION -- EXCLUSIVE: Chiefs mourn loss of 'genius'

THE U.S. CONNECTION -- EXCLUSIVE: Chiefs mourn loss of 'genius'

By Jon Clements | August 27, 2010

The full extent of murdered spy Gareth Williams' role in the world of espionage slowly began to emerge last night.

He was rated as one of the best codebreakers in the business - an elite agent who fought in secret to thwart al-Qaeda terror attacks at home and abroad.

And the 31-year-old maths genius's unique skills were also recognised by spy chiefs across the Atlantic.

Despite a dislike of flying, he regularly travelled from London to Baltimore to meet US National Security Agency officials at their Fort Meade HQ - dubbed the Puzzle Palace.

He made the trip up to four times a year "on business" for the Government's GCHQ listening post.

Last night his uncle told how he would mysteriously disappear for up to three or four weeks at a time.

Speaking at his farmhouse at Anglesey, North Wales, Michael Hughes said: "The trips were very hush-hush. They were so secret that I only recently found out about them - and we're a very close family. It had become part of his job in the past few years. His last trip out there was a few weeks ago, but he was regularly back and forth."

Mr Williams' mysterious death has shocked and dismayed officials at the NSA, which has an agreement with GCHQ to pool their signal intelligence - known as SigInt.

Fort Meade officials have been updated on the police investigation into how the keen cyclist, who was on attachment to MI6, was found dead in a sports holdall in his bathtub.

They are anxious to know if there has been any breach of global security as a result of the murder at Mr Williams' Government-owned flat in Pimlico, Central London.

Britain now relies heavily on the NSA to help monitor phone calls, emails, texts and other communications of UK terror suspects.

When MI5 discovered the plot in 2006 by British Muslims to bomb transatlantic jets, GCHQ called in the NSA to help - and Williams worked closely alongside them.

Spy satellites tracked and secretly copied emails from mastermind Rashid Rauf in Pakistan to the two ringleaders in Walthamstow, East London. The messages were vital to the 2008 convictions of Abdullah Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain.

Mr Williams, who won a first class honours degree in maths at just 17, used to spend an average 19 days on each US trip before taking a fortnight's holiday.

One Western intelligence source told the Mirror: "He will have had crucial high-level meetings with American intelligence officers. His job would have been crucial to the security of the UK and our interests abroad - and also to America and Europe.

"Although not particularly high up the GCHQ ladder, the importance of his role should not be underestimated. The man was a mathematical genius."

It is thought Mr Williams may have had input into the monitoring of communications between Taliban commanders in Afghanistan - and even the tracking of serious organised crime suspects.

His death is being seen as a major blow to the security services because of his unusual and rare talents. A spokesman for Bangor University, where he completed his degree in just two years, described the fitness fanatic as "extremely gifted".

And a former classmate at Uwchradd Bodedern secondary in Anglesey said: "Nobody ever needed a calculator when Gareth was around."

Police investigating his death continue to focus on his personal life as they try to establish a motive.

Relatives are baffled by claims his body lay undiscovered for up to two weeks as his sister Ceri, from Chester, says she spoke to him last Wednesday.

This Is London : Spy 'may have known his killer'

Spy 'may have known his killer'

August 27, 2010

The private life of a British code breaker found dead in his flat is being investigated amid speculation that he could have died during a sex game gone wrong.

Detectives investigating the murder of Gareth Williams are looking into the possibility that he lived a double life and may have known his killer.

A report in The Times on Friday claims that bondage gear and equipment associated with sado-masochism were removed from the 30-year-old's London apartment by police looking for clues.

The GCHQ mathematics prodigy's decomposing body was found stuffed into a bag in the bath of his central London Government flat on Monday, but the mystery over his final hours deepened after a post-mortem examination failed to identify a cause of death. Further tests will determine if the cycling fanatic was asphyxiated or poisoned, as well as if drugs or alcohol were present in his system.

A pathologist found Mr Williams was not stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation. Police refused to categorise the death as a murder, despite the bizarre circumstances, as they insist he may have died innocently.

One line of inquiry is that he is the victim of a sex game that went wrong and questions remain over why he was not discovered sooner.

Mr Williams was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of MI6 from his job at national "listening post" GCHQ in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

Police believe Mr Williams's body could have lain undiscovered for up to a fortnight and it is thought he was on holiday at the time of his death. They suspect the key to the case could lie in his private life and are examining his mobile phone and financial records as well as CCTV cameras around his home.

Sources played down speculation that the murder was linked to his secretive line of work. Investigators suspect Mr Williams might have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat in smart Alderney Street, Pimlico.

On Thursrday, Mr Williams's parents Ian and Ellen travelled to London with his sister Ceri from their home in Anglesey to speak to police and formally identify his body.

Daily Record : Revealed: Murdered spy was elite codebreaker and made secret trips to US

Revealed: Murdered spy was elite codebreaker and made secret trips to US

By Jon Clements | August 27, 2010

MURDERED spy Gareth Williams was one of the world's elite codebreakers helping US spooks foil al-Qaeda terrorism, it was revealed yesterday.

The 31-year-old maths genius jetted to America regularly to meet National Security Agency officials at their Fort Meade HQ in Maryland, nicknamed "The Puzzle Palace".

Williams's mysterious death has been greeted with dismay at the NSA.

Fort Meade officials have been kept updated on the investigation into how the keen cyclist, on attachment to MI6, was found dead in a sports bag in his bath.

They are keen to know if there has been any breach of global security as a result of the murder at his Government-owned flat in Pimlico, central London.

Police investigating Williams's death continue to focus on his personal life hoping to establish who have a motive to kill him.

Relatives are baffled by suggestions his body was undiscovered for up to two weeks as sister Ceri, from Chester, spoke to him last Wednesday.

Further tests to establish the cause of death may not be completed until next week and detectives are urgently checking his mobile phone records.

Speaking at his farmhouse on Anglesey, north Wales, Williams's uncle Michael Hughes revealed: "He'd be away in the US for up to three or four weeks at a time and he was making up to four of these trips per year.

"They were very hush-hush, they were so secret that I only recently found out about them and we are a very close family.

"His last trip out there was a few weeks ago, Gareth was regularly back and forth from America."

Williams, so gifted he secured a first class honours degree in maths aged just 17, spent up to 19 days working on each trip before having a fortnight on holiday.

One Western intelligence source said: "Williams will have had high-level meetings with American intelligence officers.

"His job would have been crucial to the security of the UK and UK interests abroad - but also to America and Europe.

"Although not particularly high up the GCHQ ladder, the importance of his role should not be underestimated. The man was a mathematical genuis."

Williams may have had input into the monitoring of communications between Taliban commanders in Afghanistan and even the tracking of serious organised crime suspects.

A spokesman for Bangor University, where he completed his degree in just two years, described the fitness fanatic as "extremely gifted".

He said: "Gareth came here at the age of 15 and he attained the highest degree possible. It is an exceptional achievement for any student, let alone someone so young."

Former classmate Dylan Parry said: "Gareth seemed precocious yet naive about the harsher realities of life. He was someone people could easily take advantage of.

"It would have been very hard to imagine Gareth in a relationship or attracted to the vain things of life."

Britain relies heavily on the NSA to help monitor the telephone calls, emails and texts of UK terror suspects.

When MI5 discovered the plot in 2006 by British Muslims to bomb transatlantic jets, GCHQ called in the NSA to help.

Williams worked closely alongside them.

Spy satellites tracked emails from mastermind Rashid Rauf in Pakistan to the two ringleaders in London.

The messages were vital in convicting Abdullah Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain in 2008.

Sydney Morning Herald : Cause of death still a mystery in case of 'brilliant' MI6 agent

Cause of death still a mystery in case of 'brilliant' MI6 agent

Paola Totaro | August 27, 2001

Speculation is becoming more feverish over the reason for the gruesome death of Gareth Williams, writes Paola Totaro in London.

IT BEARS all the hallmarks of a Cold War thriller - an athletic young recluse living in a chic London flat, a mysterious job working ''with codes'' and a violent death by unknown hands.

The murder of Gareth Williams - a 30-year-old communications officer seconded to the British Intelligence Service from GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters), Britain's eavesdropping centre - has thrust a very private life into the glare of the public spotlight.

Williams was found in his top-floor Pimlico apartment on Tuesday night in a gruesome scene akin to a crime novel. His body, thought to have been decomposing for up to two weeks, was found stuffed into a large sports holdall, which had been placed in the bath.

Reports that he had been stabbed and dismembered have been denied but police appear to have confirmed that his mobile phone was found carefully laid alongside several SIM cards.

Speculation that he had been murdered because of his work erupted immediately: for the past few years, Williams had worked with GCHQ, Britain's biggest listening post. The 5000-strong organisation in Cheltenham eavesdrops on global communications and monitors terrorist threats.

Yet during the past year, he had moved to London and it was colleagues at MI6, across the Thames from his elegant London flat, that reported him missing.

Nobody knows what he was working on but the city apartment has been described as a far cry from the granny flat he had lived in at Cheltenham and to which he was to return on September 3.

The Cheltenham flat was ''floral carpets, silk flowers and potpourri'', according to an account in London's Independent. His imminent return to the little flat near GCHQ has now been linked to the possibility that the reason for Williams's death may have been rather more banal, and the work of a jealous lover.

Yet the spy connection has continued apace amid revelations that the chic property in Pimlico - rented to a succession of people with Cheltenham GCHQ links - was owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands called New Rodina, the term for motherland in Russia.

Neighbours are well-heeled, including former Conservative home secretaries Sir Leon Brittan and Michael Howard.

Williams's long-time Cheltenham landlady, Jenny Elliott, 71, has spent the past 48 hours talking to London's feverish press, describing the perfect tenant over 10 years, quiet, reclusive, seemingly without friends and visited by family only once.

Girlfriends were never seen, although he worked late into the night: ''All I heard was a tape recorder being rewound or listened to over and over, although he must have had his earphones in because I couldn't make out what it was,'' she told The Independent.

''He was an extremely intelligent person but would not talk about his job as it was a secret. All he told me was it was something to do with codes,'' she told the Telegraph. ''It's a real tragedy what's happened. Gareth was a really nice guy who was polite and mild-mannered and wouldn't hurt a fly. He was a cycling fanatic and was forever off on some bike ride or another.''

Williams was a maths graduate who began a masters in advanced mathematics at St Catherine's College, Cambridge. His family described him as ''brilliant'' and he had attended a special primary school, and university one day a week while at secondary school. In 2001, during the notoriously gruelling masters degree, he failed an exam and left the course, immediately beginning working at GCHQ.

His parents, from Anglesey, flew back to Britain from a foreign holiday to identify their son's body. A first autopsy on Wednesday failed to establish a cause of death, AFP reported. Further tests are under way.

Police will describe the death only as ''suspicious and unexplained'' and inquiries are also focusing on his lifestyle. It is believed he was on annual leave while he was missing, perhaps explaining the time it took to report his disappearance.

Guardian : Murdered spy's family 'deeply upset' about private life claims

Murdered spy's family 'deeply upset' about private life claims

Cousin says family in state of shock, as report says Gareth Williams was regular visitor to Pentagon listening post

By Mark Tran | August 27, 2010

The family of a murdered British spy said today they were "deeply upset" over claims about his private life and suggested the security services may be behind a smear campaign.

Gareth Williams's body was discovered in a holdall in the bath of a flat in Pimlico, central London, on Monday. Police believe he may have been dead for two weeks.

Williams, 30, worked at GCHQ, the eavesdropping and security centre, was days from completing a year-long secondment at MI6 and, it has emerged, was a regular visitor to the US national security agency that intercepts and analyses foreign communications.

However, reports that police had found evidence linking him to a male escort and that bondage equipment was found at his flat were challenged by his family.

William Hughes, 62, a Plaid Cymru councillor on the Isle of Anglesey county council and a cousin of Williams's mother, Ellen, said there was no evidence the allegations were correct.

He said: "I don't see any evidence of it. It never crossed my mind that Gareth was that sort of person. He left home at a young age and what happened in his private life was his business.

"When you have these rumours in the papers, it is most distressing. It is heartbreaking that he has died so young and his family have enough on their plate without having to read these stories.

"Gareth's parents are not doing well at all. They are in a state of shock and struggling to come to terms with what has happened. They have seen what has been in the papers and they are very, very upset about these untruths."

Hughes said it was possible the government or another agency may be trying to discredit Williams, who had been due to return to a rented flat in Cheltenham, where GCHQ is based.

The Daily Mail reported that Williams flew to the NSA, the Pentagon's listening post, up to four times a year. He returned from his last trip a few weeks before he was found dead. The paper said US intelligence officers were poring over Williams's work and personal life to see whether the circumstances of his death endangered US national security.

Tests are being carried out to determine whether he was asphyxiated, and whether drugs or alcohol were in his system. The tests are expected to take weeks.

Williams left school at 15, got a first-class degree in maths at 17, and a PhD at Manchester University. His former maths teacher, Geraint Williams, said: "He was the best logician and the pupil with the fastest brain I have ever met. You only had to say things once, that's why he was so successful."

Investigators suspect Williams may have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat. Police have begun examining his mobile phone and financial records as well as CCTV cameras from streets and businesses surrounding his home.

His flat has been the subject of a fingertip search amid fears that top-secret work material could have gone missing. Officers broke down the door of his flat on Monday afternoon when attempts by government officials to locate him through his former landlady failed.

Telegraph : Family fury at private life smears of British spy Gareth Williams

Family fury at private life smears of British spy Gareth Williams

Duncan Gardham, Richard Edwards and Gordon Rayner | August 27, 2010

The family of Gareth Williams, the murdered British spy, have attacked “completely false” smears about his private life.

As police focused inquiries on his close friends and associates, it was disclosed that the 31-year-old MI6 worker’s parents were “furious” about claims that he had a secret double life, including suggestions he was gay, or a transvestite.

Police also dismissed reports of bondage equipment being found in the London flat where Mr Williams was discovered, and claims that his mobile phone contained numbers for male escorts.

Detectives admitted they are baffled by the death and yesterday launched a second forensic sweep of the crime scene after all initial inquiries had failed to turn up a lead.

The key question police are trying to clarify is why the killer — or a partner — placed Mr Williams's body in a large hold-all in the bath.

Police are working on the assumption it is a murder but have not ruled out that Mr Williams could have died in a bizarre accident or from an accidental drugs overdose.

The investigation is focused on his immediate circle of friends and associates. One theory is that someone who was with him in his flat when he died panicked and put his body in the bag to disguise what happened.

The spy’s parents, Ellen and Ian, who live in Holyhead, were said to be “absolutely devastated” and “raw with emotion”.

William Hughes, 62, the victim’s uncle, said they were also “very, very angry” about reports of secrets in his private life.

“It is completely false. The lad had been away from home for a long time — we did not know much about his private life, but it has never crossed any of our minds that he could be gay. It's not the picture they have of their son.

“Maybe it's the Government or somebody trying to discredit him.”

The agent, who worked for the GCHQ listening station in Cheltenham and who was on secondment to MI6, was found by police on Monday evening. A post mortem was inconclusive and police are still waiting for the results of toxicology tests which could shed light on how he died.

There was also no obvious sign of him being strangled or smothered and insiders say the circumstances of his death remain “puzzling”.

Detectives are trying to establish Mr Williams's last known movements and speaking to friends and colleagues about his private life.

However initial sweeps of CCTV and telephone records have failed to uncover any clues.

There was no sign of any forced entry at the flat, suggesting that the killer was someone Mr Williams knew.

One source said: "We are treating this as murder but we really have no idea at this stage how he died. There are no obvious marks on the body and we are waiting for the results of toxicology tests.

“All we have right now is a body in a bag in a bath. We have no pre-concieved ideas of what happened but we have been talking to people who knew Gareth to build up a picture of his last movements and carefully piecing things together. Our forensics officers are still in the flat to see if they can get any closer to identifying whether anyone else was with him when he died."

Telegraph : British spy death investigation focuses on Gareth Williams' private life

British spy death investigation focuses on Gareth Williams' private life

August 27, 2010

The private life of Gareth Williams, the British code breaker found dead in his flat, is being investigated amid speculation that he could have died during a sex game gone wrong.

Detectives investigating the murder of Gareth Williams are looking into the possibility that he lived a double life and the absence of any indication of a break-in suggests he may have known his killer.

A report in The Times today claims that bondage gear and equipment associated with sado-masochism were removed from the 30-year-old's London apartment by police looking for clues.

The GCHQ mathematics prodigy's decomposing body was found stuffed into a bag in the bath of his central London Government flat on Monday.

But the mystery over his final hours deepened after a post-mortem examination failed to identify a cause of death.

Further tests will determine if the cycling fanatic was asphyxiated or poisoned, as well as if drugs or alcohol were present in his system.

A pathologist found Mr Williams was not stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation.

Police refused to categorise the death as a murder, despite the bizarre circumstances, as they insist he may have died innocently.

One line of inquiry is that he is the victim of a sex game that went wrong and questions remain over why he was not discovered sooner.

Mr Williams was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of MI6 from his job at national ''listening post'' GCHQ in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

Police believe Mr Williams's body could have lain undiscovered for up to a fortnight and it is thought he was on holiday at the time of his death.

They suspect the key to the case could lie in his private life and are examining his mobile phone and financial records as well as CCTV cameras around his home.

Sources played down speculation that the murder was linked to his secretive line of work.

Investigators suspect Mr Williams might have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat in Alderney Street, Pimlico.

Yesterday, Mr Williams's parents Ian and Ellen travelled to London with his sister Ceri from their home in Anglesey to speak to police and formally identify his body.

Further details of Mr Williams continued to emerge as friends described him as an extremely bright, quiet and determined man.

Childhood friend Dylan Parry, 34, said Mr Williams was academically gifted but socially naive and could be easily led.

He said: ''He was the kind of person who found it difficult to engage with people on a normal level.''

Mirror : Security chiefs mourn loss of ‘genius’ spy Gareth Williams

Security chiefs mourn loss of ‘genius’ spy Gareth Williams

By Jon Clements | August 27, 2010

The full extent of murdered spy Gareth Williams’ role in the world of espionage slowly began to emerge last night.

He was rated as one of the best code-breakers in the business – an elite agent who fought in secret to thwart al-Qaeda terror attacks at home and abroad.

And the 31-year-old maths genius’s unique skills were also recognised by spy chiefs across the Atlantic.

Despite a dislike of flying, he regularly travelled from London to Baltimore to meet US National Security Agency officials at their Fort Meade HQ – dubbed the Puzzle Palace.

He made the trip up to four times a year “on business” for the Government’s GCHQ listening post.

Last night his uncle told how he would mysteriously disappear for up to three or four weeks at a time.

Speaking at his farmhouse at Anglesey, North Wales, Michael Hughes said: “The trips were very hush-hush. They were so secret that I only recently found out about them – and we’re a very close family. It had become part of his job in the past few years. His last trip out there was a few weeks ago, but he was regularly back and forth.”

Mr Williams’ mysterious death has shocked and dismayed officials at the NSA, which has an agreement with GCHQ to pool their signal intelligence – known as SigInt.

Fort Meade officials have been updated on the police investigation into how the cyclist, who was on attachment to MI6, was found dead in a sports holdall in his bathtub.

They are anxious to know if there has been any breach of global security as a result of the murder at Mr Williams’ Government-owned flat in Pimlico, Central London.

Britain now relies heavily on the NSA to help monitor phone calls, emails, texts and other communications of UK terror suspects.

When MI5 discovered the plot in 2006 by British Muslims to bomb transatlantic jets, GCHQ called in the NSA to help – and Williams worked closely alongside them.

Spy satellites tracked and secretly copied emails from mastermind Rashid Rauf in Pakistan to the two ringleaders in Walthamstow, East London. The messages were vital to the 2008 convictions of Abdullah Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain. Mr Williams, who won a first class honours degree in maths at just 17, used to spend an average 19 days on each US trip before taking a fortnight’s holiday.

One Western intelligence source told the Mirror: “He will have had crucial high-level meetings with American intelligence officers. His job would have been crucial to the security of the UK and our interests abroad – and also to America and Europe.

“Although not particularly high up the GCHQ ladder, the importance of his role should not be underestimated. The man was a mathematical genius.”

It is thought Mr Williams may have had input into the monitoring of communications between Taliban commanders in Afghanistan – and even the tracking of serious organised crime suspects.

His death is being seen as a major blow to the security services because of his unusual and rare talents. A spokesman for Bangor University, where he completed his degree in just two years, described the fitness fanatic as “extremely gifted”.

And a former classmate at Uwchradd Bodedern secondary in Anglesey said: “Nobody ever needed a calculator when Gareth was around.”

Police investigating his death continue to focus on his personal life as they try to establish a motive.

Relatives are baffled by claims his body lay undiscovered for up to two weeks as his sister Ceri, from Chester, says she spoke to him last Wednesday.

THE PUZZLE PALACE

The National Security Agency HQ - the Puzzle Palace - is "the largest espionage organisation the world has known".

Author James Bamford, who was given access to the organisation in Fort Meade, Maryland, in the US, said it intercepts millions of emails and calls an hour.

Bamford, author of The Puzzle Palace, said: "It is capable of eavesdropping on conversations virtually anywhere on the planet." The CIA and British partner, MI6, are better known, but the NSA and GCHQ gather most intelligence. The NSA also has a far bigger budget than the CIA and was known to have bugged six swing UN nations over Iraq. And while most intercepts are pulled from the ether, some are gathered the old-fashioned way - bugs planted in offices by "cleaners".

Belfast Telegraph : MI6 probe over body find delay

MI6 probe over body find delay

By Terri Judd | August 27, 2010

MI6 is investigating why it took two weeks to discover that a GCHQ officer on secondment to the agency had been murdered.

Gareth Williams's body was found stuffed into a sports bag in the bath at his home in central London by Metropolitan Police officers. They forced their way into the flat on Monday afternoon after colleagues reported he had not been seen for some time.

While police and MI6 officers do not believe the 31-year-old's murder had anything to do with his work as a codes and ciphers expert, they are concerned that any agent could go missing for such a long time without checks being made on their whereabouts. Investigators suspect Mr Williams may have known his killer, as there were no signs of forced entry.

Windsor Star : Murdered spy may have mixed with bad crowd

Murdered spy may have mixed with bad crowd

By Richard Edwards and John Bingham, The Daily Telegraph | August 27, 2010

London -- The British spy found murdered in London this week was "one of life's innocents" who could have fallen in with "unsafe" company, friends have claimed.

As police continued to draw a blank over the mysterious death of Gareth Williams, friends said he had an extraordinary mathematical mind but was "very naive about people."

There was no sign of forced entry at the flat in central London where the 31 year-old was found stuffed into a sports bag on Monday afternoon, suggesting the killer was someone Williams knew.

Detectives have been unable to find any regular friends, male or female, linked to the cipher and codes expert, who worked for MI6 and the GCHQ listening station in Cheltenham. They are investigating whether he had recently met his killer and are analyzing mobile phone sim cards found in the flat in Pimlico, central London.

Detectives are also investigating whether he lived a double life unknown to his superiors and are studying his recent movements, including a trip to Las Vegas he had described as a "real eye opener." School friends said that Williams was nicknamed "child genius." but added that he was "not a good judge of character."

Williams took a math General Certificate of Education at primary school and A Levels at 13. He graduated with a first from Bangor University by the age of 17 and earned a masters at Cambridge University. Like many prodigies, however, he struggled to make friends after being catapulted into the company of older people at an early age.

Dylan Parry, 34, a friend from his home in Anglesey, said he was an isolated child only interested in maths and computers. "He never really made friends, either his own age or from those younger than him. He didn't have any of the normal childhood interests or pursuits of teenagers.

"His only real interest was maths. He was obsessed with his subject. Socially he was very awkward but very nice."

Parry added that the spy was someone "people could easily take advantage of" and suggested the murder may have been nothing to do with his work for MI6. "Back then (in his teens) he wasn't the kind to have a girlfriend -- or a boyfriend for that matter. He was very naive about people.

"I wouldn't have thought he was a very good judge of character and it's possible he got to know someone who wasn't very safe. He was so innocent."

Geraint Williams, a math teacher at Bodedern High School, said the "exceptional" pupil had "the best brain I have ever seen."

"He was the best logician. It didn't surprise me at all that he was very interested in codes and ciphers and it didn't surprise me that he was recruited by GCHQ. He was definitely going to go into something like that with his brain."

Keith Thompson, who knew Williams through Holyhead Cycling Club, said: "I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did with Gareth."

© Copyright (c) The Windsor Star

Channel 4 : Family shock after spy sex claims

Family shock after spy sex claims

August 27, 2010

The family of a spy who was found dead in a bag in his bath are "shocked" by allegations about his life. Channel 4 News hears that code breakers are still needed by governments.

Gareth Williams had worked at GCHQ, but was recently based at MI6. His body was found by police on Monday in the flat which had been provided for him in London by the government. Scotland Yard detectives have been investigating his private life in an attempt to discover why he was killed.

There have been claims that Mr Williams was linked to a male escort and that bondage equipment was found in his home. A relative said there is no evidence the allegations are true: "I have spoken to Gareth's parents and they are not doing well at all. They are in a state of shock and struggling to come to terms with what has happened. They have seen what has been in the papers and they are very, very upset about these untruths."

It is understood that Mr Williams made regular trips to Washington DC and Fort Meade, near Baltimore.

Bob Ayres, a former intelligence officer from America, said that code breakers are still very much needed today: "As long as people use codes to protect their communications, there will still be people working to break them.

"Codes now are based on sophisticated cryptographic systems. Spies are used to create and produce cryptographic systems that other people can't break, and to break the systems used by other countries. These systems are based on sophisticated mathematics, so that is the ideal background."

Channel 4 News has exclusively learnt that the government's most secretive intelligence agencies have launched internal enquiries into the vetting of an MI6 employee found dead in his flat.

"There is nothing to suggest a security leak", a source told Channel 4 News. "This is most likely the human tragedy of a private young man who may have had issues."

GCHQ conducts what it called "rigorous security clearance" for potential employees to ascertain whether there is the "the risk of an individual being placed in a potentially compromising position."

"If you do not meet the Developed Vetting requirements for the job, or fail to disclose any security related issues or concerns, you will not be considered for employment," the organisation said.

The CIA has also been investigating any possible security breach, but British authorities believed that Mr Williams' killer probably did not know about his work

A childhood friend of Gareth Williams, Dylan Parry, said Mr Williams was academically gifted but socially naïve. Bob Ayres said that intelligence organisations prefer staff to be: "Quiet, reserved and keep to themselves. If you are complying with the desires of an intelligence organisation, you do not tell people what you do or where you work. You do not get engaged in conversations which might lead you to say what you do.

"Either Gareth Williams was being a good intelligence practitioner, or he was just shy and uncomfortable.

"Intelligence, spying, these are jobs and business that go on every day, 24 hours a day. Every nation spies on everyone else and everybody spies on them. There is nothing romantic or intriguing about it. It is just a business. In terms of men in raincoats standing under bridges, that is a very small percentage of what actually goes on in the intelligence business.

"You might think it is a game, but it is when you realise the consequences of losing the game it becomes more serious."

Further tests will be carried out on Mr Williams' body after a post-mortem examination did not identify a cause of death. A pathologist said he was not stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation.

Daily Star : MI6 SPY MURDERED BY 'MATA HARI' HONEYTRAP ASSASSIN

MI6 SPY MURDERED BY 'MATA HARI' HONEYTRAP ASSASSIN

By Jerry Lawton, chief crime correspondent | August 27, 2010

A REAL-LIFE James Bond found murdered in his bath could have fallen prey to a modern day Mata Hari.

Police found a SIM card containing telephone numbers of escort agencies in the flat where 31-year-old spy Gareth Williams was discovered stuffed inside a giant sports bag.

Porn was also recovered from the £500,000 top floor apartment.

Mr Williams, an expert code-cracker, was within days of coming to the end of a year-long secondment to MI6 and returning to GCHQ in Cheltenham, Glos.

Intelligence experts are trying to locate his laptop and MP3 player. They fear he could have been targeted by enemy agents in a “honeytrap’’. They were last night trying to determine if state secrets could be in the wrong hands.

MI6 try to infiltrate foreign terror networks such as al-Qaida and monitor the Russian and Chinese underworld.

A senior intelligence source said: “It is a major concern that classified information Mr Williams may have been privy to could have leaked.

“Establishing if national security has been compromised is our immediate priority in light of his tragic death. Items discovered in the flat suggest there may have been a sexual element to this.”

Some reports, unconfirmed by police, suggested women’s clothes in Mr Williams’ size were discovered in the apartment in Pimlico, central London, suggesting he might have been a cross-dresser.

But detectives have not ruled out the possibility his killers may have placed items there. Last night police were trying to determine if he was strangled, suffocated or poisoned.

His dad Ian, a nuclear power plant worker, mum Ellen and sister Ceri arrived in London after breaking off a holiday in the US.

Childhood pal Dylan Parry, 34, feared his school friend was vulnerable because he was “so innocent”.

Mr Williams’s best friend Raphael L’Hoste-Morton, 32, a former GCHQ colleague who works for a youth group in Gloucester, denied they had had a sexual relationship.

Mr L’Hoste-Morton, who had been on foreign exchange trips with Mr Williams, was too upset to discuss the tragedy.

UK Wired : Family 'upset' at MI6 man claims

Family 'upset' at MI6 man claims

August 27, 2010

The family of an MI6 worker found dead in a central London flat are in a "state of shock", a relative has said.

The body of Gareth Williams, 30, was found in a holdall in the bath of his Pimlico flat on Monday.

His uncle William Hughes said Mr Williams' parents in Anglesey were "struggling to come to terms" with their son's death.

Ian and Ellen Williams were "upset" about the stories in the tabloids about their son, Mr Hughes added.

Police had thought that Mr Williams' body may have been undiscovered for about two weeks after his death in the flat in Alderney Street.

They have now confirmed that he was in London from 11 August and that the last sighting of Mr Williams was on 15 August.

His family have issued a statement which said: "Gareth was a generous, loving son, brother, and friend, and he was a very private person.

"He was a great athlete, and loved cycling and music. His loss has devastated us and we would ask that anyone with information to come forward and assist the police enquiry."

A post-mortem examination failed to identify a cause of death and further tests, including toxicological analysis of his blood, are due to be carried out.

The Metropolitan Police have not classified his death as murder but are treating it as "suspicious and unexplained".

Mr Williams, a keen cyclist, was on secondment to MI6 from his communications officer's role at GCHQ.

Ian Williams works at Wylfa nuclear power station and lives in Valley, Anglesey with his wife Ellen, while their daughter Ceri lives near Wrexham.

Mr Hughes, 62, a councillor on Anglesey, who is related to Ellen Williams, said: "I have spoken to Gareth's parents and they are not doing well at all.

"They are in a state of shock and struggling to come to terms with what has happened.

"It is heartbreaking that he has died so young and his family have enough on their plate without having to read these stories."

Some of the tabloids have reported on claims about Mr Williams' private life, which police will be looking into.

Mr Williams has been described as a "maths genius" who graduated with a first class degree in maths from Bangor University aged 17.

Officers searched the London property after his colleagues reported not having seen him for about 10 days.

The First Post : Bondage gear found at MI6 flat - but was it planted?

Bondage gear found at MI6 flat - but was it planted?
[or here]

‘Male escort evidence’ and porn said to have been found at murdered spy’s flat

By Jack Bremer | August 27, 2010

Police investigating the murder of the MI6 codebreaker Gareth Williams have discovered bondage equipment in his London flat, along with evidence linking him to a male escort, according to reports emerging overnight. The findings appear to support the theory that his private life rather than national security was the motive for his murder - unless the items were planted by his killer.

Assuming they were not planted, their discovery raises concerns among national security personnel - in London and Washington - that an MI6 employee enjoying high security clearance might have had a secret lifestyle that risked his being compromised.

The CIA and the Pentagon are reported to have come into the picture because Williams travelled regularly to the States, possibly on codebreaking jobs for the US National Security Agency at Fort Meade, Maryland. The US Defence Department has refused to confirm whether he ever worked for the agency.

As The First Post reported yesterday, Williams's body was found stuffed into a holdall, sitting in the bath of the Pimlico flat where he was living while working on secondment at the MI6 headquarters, a short walk away.

Early reports said escort agency numbers had been found on one of the many mobile phone SIM cards discovered in the flat. Now police have removed porn films, bondage items and "paraphernalia associated with sado-masochism", according to a source quoted by the Times, as well as the evidence linking him to a male escort.

While investigators attempt to discover whether or not these findings are a red herring, further press interviews with old friends and acquaintances paint a picture of a loner - a gifted mathematician who had few friends.

Dylan Parry, who attended secondary school with Williams in Anglesey, north Wales, said he was "the kind of person who found it difficult to engage with people on a normal level".

But Williams's family are adamant that he is not a homosexual. His uncle William Hughes said today that his parents were "very, very angry... It's not the picture they have of their son.

"Maybe it's the Government or somebody trying to discredit him."

Sun : Spy vetting probe over bondage find

Spy vetting probe over bondage find

By ANTHONY FRANCE, JOHN KAY and NEIL SYSON | August 27, 2010

SPY chiefs launched a probe yesterday into their security vetting of murdered spook Gareth Williams as it emerged bondage gear was found in his flat.

Detectives are believed to have discovered porn films and sado-masochistic equipment.

The master codebreaker working for MI6 was also linked to a male escort.

Bosses at MI6's HQ near the flat he was using in Pimlico, central London, are investigating all aspects about his private life that might have slipped past their "positive vetting" system.

Potential employees have to declare anything that could make them blackmail targets.

A security source said: "The logic is that you cannot be blackmailed about something your employers are already aware of."

The decomposed body of keen cyclist Mr Williams, 31, was found in a suitcase in the bathroom at his flat on Monday.

It was also revealed he made several trips to the US - and was thought to have been helping US intelligence in the fight against al-Qaeda.

He returned from his last trip to America a few weeks ago.

Mr Williams is said to have regularly travelled to Baltimore to meet officials at the US National Security Agency at their Fort Meade headquarters, nicknamed Puzzle Palace.

It is thought that he may also have been involved in monitoring conversations between Taliban commanders.

The maths genius was in the US up to four times a year.

His uncle William Hughes said: "The trips were very hush-hush. They were so secret that I only recently found out about them - and we're a very close family."

The CIA was last night also said to be investigating the circumstances surrounding his death.

Mr Williams, originally from Holyhead, North Wales, had been on secondment to MI6 from GCHQ, Britain's eavesdropping base in Cheltenham, Gloucs.

Independent : Dead spy's family 'upset by private life claims'

Dead spy's family 'upset by private life claims'

By Mike Hornby and Chris Greenwood, PA | August 27, 2010

The family of a murdered British spy were in a "state of shock" today as lurid claims emerged about his private life.

Scotland Yard detectives continued to investigate whether GCHQ codes expert Gareth Williams, 30, lived a secretive double life.

The mathematics genius, who was on secondment to MI6, was found dead in a sports holdall in the bath of his Government flat on Monday.

Investigators have begun picking through his private life amid claims he has been linked to a male escort and bondage equipment was found in his home.

Sources close to the investigation suggested these latest claims are not true, raising questions about where they came from.

Relative William Hughes, 62, a councillor on Anglesey, said there is no evidence the allegations are correct.

Mr Hughes, a cousin of Mr Williams's mother, Ellen, said: "I have spoken to Gareth's parents and they are not doing well at all.

"They are in a state of shock and struggling to come to terms with what has happened.

"They have seen what has been in the papers and they are very, very upset about these untruths. I don't see any evidence of it.

"It never crossed my mind that Gareth was that sort of person. He left home at a young age and what happened in his private life was his business.

"When you have these rumours in the papers, it is most distressing.

"It is heartbreaking that he has died so young and his family have enough on their plate without having to read these stories."

Mr Hughes added that it is possible the Government, or other agency, may be trying to discredit Mr Williams.

Police focused their investigations on Mr Williams's private life after his decomposing body was discovered when colleagues raised the alarm.

The mathematics prodigy was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of the Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, in Vauxhall, London.

He was due to return to a rented flat in Cheltenham where Government Communications Headquarters, GCHQ, is based.

It is understood Mr Williams also worked for the United States National Security Agency and made regular trips to Washington DC and Fort Meade, near Baltimore.

The mystery over his final hours deepened after a post-mortem examination failed to identify a cause of death.

Further tests will determine if the cycling fanatic was asphyxiated or poisoned, as well as if drugs or alcohol were present in his system.

A pathologist found Mr Williams was not stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation.

Police refused to categorise the death as a murder, despite the bizarre circumstances, as they insist he may have died innocently.

One line of inquiry is that he is the victim of a sex game that went wrong and questions remain over why he was not discovered sooner.

Police believe Mr Williams's body could have lain undiscovered for up to a fortnight and are examining his mobile phone and financial records.

They suspect Mr Williams might have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat in smart Alderney Street, Pimlico.

Friends described him as an extremely bright, quiet and determined man who did not discuss his private life.

Childhood friend Dylan Parry, 34, said Mr Williams was academically gifted but socially naive and could be easily-led.

Independent : MI6 inquiry will ask why it took two weeks to find murdered officer

MI6 inquiry will ask why it took two weeks to find murdered officer

By Terri Judd | August 27, 2010

MI6 is investigating why it took two weeks to discover that a GCHQ officer on secondment to the agency had been murdered.

Gareth Williams's body was found stuffed into a sports bag in the bath at his home in central London by Metropolitan Police officers. They forced their way into the flat on Monday afternoon after colleagues reported he had not been seen for some time.

While police and MI6 officers do not believe the 31-year-old's murder had anything to do with his work as a codes and ciphers expert, they are concerned that any agent could go missing for such a long time without checks being made on their whereabouts.

Investigators suspect Mr Williams may have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat in a smart street in Pimlico where his neighbours included wealthy bankers and politicians, including former home secretaries Michael Howard and Lord Brittan.

Scotland Yard's Homicide and Serious Crime Command was investigating whether the victim's private life or relationships offered any clues that could identify his murderer. As a fingertip search was conducted on the property, police have been examining his telephone and financial records, as well as CCTV footage from the area. A post-mortem examination proved inconclusive and detectives are now awaiting the result of toxicology tests.

Before gaining his post at the national "listening post" Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), Mr Williams would have undergone strict vetting including a nine-month process of interviews, background checks and a medical. As well as examining his family history and personal circumstances, it would assess whether he had the character for the secret world of intelligence work.

However, there were questions raised last night as to whether he may have held something back from his employers. Family and friends painted a picture of an athletic young man, a keen cyclist and runner, who was deeply private and rarely socialised.

His mother's cousin, William Hughes, said: "I knew he worked at GCHQ and he had been working in London but I didn't know what he did. It wasn't said that we shouldn't talk about it, I simply never asked and he never told me. He was a bright boy from a young age and his parents were very proud of him."

Mr Hughes added that his parents, Ian and Ellen, as well as his younger sister, Ceri, were deeply shocked and devastated by the news. His mother and father, from Wales, were picked up by police upon their return from a holiday in America on Tuesday and taken to identify his body in London.

A childhood friend, Dylan Parry, 34, described Mr Williams as academically gifted but socially naive, an isolated boy fascinated by mathematics and computers. Mr Parry, who went to school with Mr Williams at Uwchradd Bodedern secondary in Anglesey, said that he travelled to Bangor University every week aged 16 to study for a mathematics degree part-time. He later graduated from the university with a first class degree.

"It was clear he was going to go far, but we all assumed he would end up in academia. Finding out he became a spy was a shock," he added.

Keith Thompson, of Holyhead Cycling Club, said he had known Mr Williams since he joined the club at the age of 17. He said: "It's true that he was very quiet. He wasn't a great conversationalist. We were club mates but Gareth wasn't the sort to go to the pub after a race so he didn't have any close friends in the group. I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did with Gareth."

Charles Cumming, author of A Spy by Nature, who was approached himself for recruitment by the SIS after university, said the secretive nature of the work and the long hours could prove a real burden on relationships and many chose to mix within the services.

But he added: "I think the pressure that spies are put under has been exaggerated by programmes like Spooks. People who go into the work are highly intelligent, highly motivated and well aware of the sacrifices they are making. To a man or woman they don't find the restrictions all that difficult."

While MI6 remained an "alpha male" culture, he added, GCHQ was a very different environment.

Express : DELAY OVER SPY'S CAUSE OF DEATH

DELAY OVER SPY'S CAUSE OF DEATH

August 27, 2010

Investigators are still days away from finding out the exact cause of death of British code-breaker Gareth Williams, police said.

The complicated nature of the tests currently being carried out mean it could be well into next week before police are able to piece together how the maths genius died.

A post mortem examination undertaken earlier this week proved inconclusive and officers are still days away from determining if he was asphyxiated, poisoned or if drugs or alcohol were present in his system.

He was last seen alive eight days before his corpse was found stuffed in a bag at his flat.

A confirmed sighting of Mr Williams, 30, was made on August 15 in London, officers said.

But police would not say whether the sighting was made on CCTV or came from another source.

The investigation is being led by the Met's Homicide Command with the security-vetted Counter Terror Command (SO15) also playing a lesser role in proceedings.

Scotland Yard played down reports that thousands of pounds had passed through Mr Williams' bank account shortly before his death as "pure speculation".

It was reported that three sums of £2,000 were paid into his account on consecutive days and then withdrawn on consecutive days.

Meanwhile, Mr Williams' family hit out at rumours that suggested the dead man was involved in risky sexual practices. In a statement they said speculation linking the secret service employee to a male escort and bondage equipment had been "very distressing".

Express : MURDERED SPY MAY HAVE MET HIS KILLER ON MISSIONS TO USA

MURDERED SPY MAY HAVE MET HIS KILLER ON MISSIONS TO USA

August 27, 2010

THE hunt for the killer of British spy Gareth Williams switched to the USA yesterday.

Grieving relatives of the MI6 code breaker revealed that he had been sent on several missions to America.

He is understood to have returned from there shortly before he was killed.

Police investigating the murder of the brilliant mathematician are trying to establish who he met in the US and if any of his contacts visited Britain recently. Scotland Yard detectives are trying to build up a picture of his private life and his movements in the month before he was killed.

They are convinced the key to the mystery lies in his personal not his professional life. His uncle Bill Hughes, of Anglesey said: “Gareth regularly flew out to the US on business. He’d be gone for a couple of weeks, maybe three, each time and he probably went out there two or three times a year for the past two years, I think. He must have got home from his last trip out there two or three weeks before he died.”

Family and friends described the spy as a man of great intellectual ability, bordering on genius, but also a loner, who was vulnerable because he was so naive. The 31-year-old was found dead on Monday afternoon stuffed in a sports bag and dumped in the bath of his flat in Pimlico, central London.

His body had lain there for up two weeks. Scientists are carrying out more tests after a post mortem examination proved inconclusive. Although no secret material is thought to have been stolen, detectives have not ruled out the possibility that the killer is from the intelligence world.

They believe the spy may have known his attacker and let him into the flat. However, reports that the spy was a transvestite with a secret double life have been dismissed. Mr Williams was on secondment to MI6 from the Government communications centre GCHQ. He was due back at the Cheltenham-based establishment next week.

The cycling fanatic was brought up in Holyhead, Anglesey, left school at 15 and got a first class degree from Bangor University at just 17 and then earned a PhD from Manchester University. Former teacher Geraint Williams said: “He was the best logician and the pupil with the fastest brain I have ever met.”

Dylan Parry, a childhood friend, said: “He didn’t have any of the normal childhood interests or pursuits of teenagers. He was extremely quiet.” In an internet tribute, he added: “Gareth was one of life’s innocents – so it’s hard to believe that he found himself involved in the rather exciting, and sometimes dangerous, world of espionage.”

Keith Thompson, of the Holyhead Cycling Club, said: “We were clubmates but Gareth wasn’t the sort to go to the pub after a race so he didn’t have any close friends in the group. I never spoke to him about his job or his private life. Nobody did with Gareth.”

Sydney Morning Herald : UK police probe private life of dead spy

UK police probe private life of dead spy

August 27, 2010

The private life of a British code breaker found dead in his flat is being investigated amid speculation that he could have died during a sex game gone wrong.

Detectives investigating the murder of Gareth Williams are looking into the possibility that he lived a double life and may have known his killer.

A report in The Times on Friday claims that bondage gear and equipment associated with sado-masochism were removed from the 30-year-old's London apartment by police looking for clues.

Williams' decomposing body was found stuffed into a bag in the bath of his central London government flat on Monday.

But the mystery over his final hours deepened after a post-mortem examination failed to identify a cause of death.

Further tests will determine if Williams was asphyxiated or poisoned, as well as if drugs or alcohol were present in his system.

A pathologist found Williams was not stabbed or shot and there were no obvious signs of strangulation.

Police refused to categorise the death as a murder, despite the bizarre circumstances, as they insist he may have died innocently.

One line of inquiry is that he is the victim of a sex game that went wrong and questions remain over why he was not discovered sooner.

Williams was days from completing a one-year secondment to the headquarters of MI6 from his job at national "listening post", the GCHQ intelligence agency in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

Police believe Williams' body could have lain undiscovered for up to a fortnight and it is thought he was on holiday at the time of his death.

They suspect the key to the case could lie in his private life and are examining his mobile phone and financial records as well as CCTV cameras around his home.

Sources played down speculation that the murder was linked to his secretive line of work.

Investigators suspect Williams might have known his killer as there was no sign of forced entry at his top-floor flat.

On Thursday, Williams' parents travelled to London with his sister from their home in Anglesey, Wales, to speak to police and formally identify his body.

Further details of Williams continued to emerge on Thursday, as friends described him as an extremely bright, quiet and determined man.

Childhood friend Dylan Parry, 34, said Williams was academically gifted but socially naive and could be easily led.

He told the London Evening Standard: "He was the kind of person who found it difficult to engage with people on a normal level."

© 2010 AAP

Sydney Morning Herald : Police try to unlock secrets of murdered British spy

Police try to unlock secrets of murdered British spy

Paola Totaro | August 27, 2010

IT BEARS all the hallmarks of a Cold War thriller - an athletic recluse living in a chic London flat, a mystery job working with codes and a violent death at the hands of strangers.

The murder of Gareth Williams, 30, a communications officer seconded to the British intelligence service from GCHQ, the UK's leviathan eavesdropping centre, has thrust a very private life into the glare of the public spotlight.

The man was found in his top-floor Pimlico apartment on Tuesday night. His body, probably decomposing for up to two weeks, was stuffed into a large sports holdall that had been placed in the bath. Reports that he had been stabbed and dismembered have been denied, but police appear to have confirmed that his mobile telephone was found carefully laid out alongside several SIM cards.

Speculation that he had been murdered because of his work erupted immediately. For the past few years, the man had worked with GCHQ, a 5000-strong organisation in Cheltenham that eavesdrops on global communications and monitors the terrorist threat.

But during the past year he had moved to London and it was colleagues at MI6, just across the Thames from his flat, that reported the man missing.

It is not clear what he was working on, but the apartment has been described as a far cry from the granny flat he had lived in at Cheltenham and to which he was to return on September 3.

His imminent return to the little flat near GCHQ has now been linked to the possibility that Mr Williams's death may have been rather more banal and the result of a jealous lover.

And yet the spy connection continues amid revelations that the Pimlico apartment - rented to a succession of people with Cheltenham GCHQ links - was owned by a company registered in the British Virgin Islands called New Rodina, the term for motherland in Russia.

Neighbours include former Conservative home secretaries Sir Leon Brittan and Michael Howard.

The man's long-time Cheltenham landlady, Jenny Elliott, 71, has spent the past 48 hours talking to the press, describing the perfect tenant: quiet, reclusive and seemingly without friends. ''All I heard was a tape recorder being rewound or listened to over and over,'' she told The Independent.

''He was an extremely intelligent person but would not talk about his job, as it was a secret. All he told me was it was something to do with codes,'' she told The Daily Telegraph.

Mr Williams was a maths graduate who began a master's in advanced mathematics at St Catherine's College, Cambridge. His family described him as brilliant.

In 2001, during his master's, he failed an exam and left the course, and immediately began working at GCHQ, apparently seconded to MI6 a year ago.

His parents, from Anglesey, flew back from a foreign holiday to identify their son's body. A post mortem, including toxicology tests, is under way.

Police will only described the man's death as ''suspicious and unexplained''. Inquiries are focusing not only on his work but his lifestyle. It is believed he was on annual leave during the period he was missing, perhaps explaining the long time for his disappearance to be reported.

His landlady said he had told her he wanted to come back to Cheltenham because he ''missed the countryside''.

This Is Gloucestershire : Bosses pay tribute to paid to murdered GCHQ spy Gareth Williams

Bosses pay tribute to paid to murdered GCHQ spy Gareth Williams

August 27, 2010

GCHQ bosses have paid tribute to murdered spy Gareth Williams.

Dr Williams, who worked at the Cheltenham base for 10 years, was found dead inside a bag in his London flat.

Bosses at the Government base last night issued a statement acknowledging for the first time Dr Williams worked at the centre in Benhall.

It said: "We can confirm Dr Gareth Williams was a GCHQ employee who was working in London.

"Gareth's sad death is the subject of a police investigation so further comment would not be appropriate.

"Our thoughts are with his family at this difficult time."

Detectives investigating the death of cycling enthusiast Dr Williams, who rented a house in Prestbury, are trying to establish a motive for his murder.

The 30-year-old's decomposing body was found stuffed into a sports holdall at his rented flat in Pimlico on Monday afternoon.

He was on secondment with MI6, but suggestions have emerged his death may have been linked to his private life.

Potential employees of GCHQ face an intrusive vetting process that reaches into every corner of their private life to reduce any possibility of blackmail.

Meanwhile, senior figures at the Cheltenham and County Cycling Club where Dr Williams was a member are considering holding a memorial to him.

Club member Don Muir said members were slowly coming to terms with the loss and were due to meet last night to discuss ways of remembering Dr Williams.

"The whole thing has been a shock," said Mr Muir.

"We haven't had a chance to get together to discuss memorials, but we are meeting for an event so will have a chance to think about it then."

Dr Willams was said to be a man who excelled academically as a teenager.

He was a maths graduate who reportedly began a masters at St Catherine's College, Cambridge.

His uncle William Hughes, from his home town of Anglesey, said: "He was a clever lad. When he was at secondary school he would go to university one day a week.

"It's a long way from Anglesey to Cheltenham and London."

Dr Williams' parents Ian and Ellen, from Valley in Anglesey, reportedly flew back from a foreign holiday yesterday to identify their son's body.

The news has shocked their small Welsh community, where villagers added to the image of a very quiet, private man.

Chris Hall, manager of the family run Valley Hotel in Valley, said: "We are a really tight-knit community here.

"But I didn't know Gareth or his family. I have been speaking to people in the village and no one seems to be able to be able to put a face to the name.

"He was obviously a very private person. It seems the whole family was very private."

Dr Williams' father was an employee at the Wylfa Nuclear Power Station in Anglesey.

A spokeswoman said the company offered "appropriate support" to all its employees.

Jenny Elliott, his former landlady in Prestbury, described Dr Williams as a "lovely guy".

His neighbour in London, Laura Houghton, 30, said: "His windows were always shut and curtains were often closed. I could never tell if anyone was in."

Yesterday, the Metropolitan Police Service said formal identification had yet to take place.

A post-mortem examination carried out at Westminster Mortuary was unable to provide a cause of death and further tests are being carried out.

The flat where Dr Williams was found is in a freehold block whose ownership is hidden behind the private company New Rodina, registered in the British Virgin Islands.

The word rodina means "motherland" in Russian and Bulgarian.

Officers from the Homicide and Serious Crime Command (HSCC) are investigating and are treating Dr Williams' death as suspicious and unexplained.