Independent : Scotland Yard boss Horgan-Howe warns MI6 over spy Gareth Williams death probe

Scotland Yard boss Horgan-Howe warns MI6 over spy Gareth Williams death probe

Tom Morgan | May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer warned MI6 it is not above the law as he revealed proposals for mass DNA screenings in the long-running Gareth Williams investigation.

An independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into how the codebreaker's body ended up in a holdall, Scotland Yard's Commissioner said.

Bernard Hogan-Howe has also told detectives to deal directly with the intelligence agency in a break with tradition at the Metropolitan Police.

Homicide detectives were previously forced to involve counter-terror colleagues in a bid to obtain statements and evidence from MI6.

But Mr Hogan-Howe was angered by the "unacceptable" breakdown in communication which saw evidence fail to come to the senior investigating officer until last week at an inquest.

When asked what powers he had to ensure MI6 co-operated, he told reporters: "It's the law."

He said mass screening in the case would be carried out on a "voluntary" basis.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: "Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams' death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored."

Mr Hogan-Howe said forensics firm LGC, which was responsible for a mix-up early in the investigation, would not be in charge of the review.

But he added: "This is not about criticising the forensic system."

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who has led the investigation since the body was found in August 2010, is likely to pass on the case to a colleague because she is being promoted.

Members of the secret services have came under fresh scrutiny after the coroner at last week's inquest said she was sure a third party locked Mr Williams inside the red holdall in which his naked body was found in his bathtub.

Giving her verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old was probably killed and it "remained a legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services may have been involved in the death.

But inquiries have yet to yield a culprit, with forensic experts still hoping for a breakthrough from DNA tests on a green towel discovered in his kitchen.

Mr Williams, a fitness enthusiast originally from Anglesey, North Wales, was found in the bag in his flat in Pimlico, central London.

PA

Beaver County Times (PA) : UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

Associated Press | May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer says spies will be asked to give DNA samples in a bid to solve the mystery of an agent whose body was found padlocked inside a sports bag in his bathtub.

Last week an inquest concluded that Gareth Williams had probably been killed by another person in a "criminally meditated act."

Coroner Fiona Wilcox was critical of the MI6 spy agency, which failed to pass evidence to investigating police.

Williams, 31, worked for Britain's GCHQ eavesdropping service. He was attached to MI6 when his remains were found in August 2010.

Metropolitan Police Commisioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said Tuesday that detectives would conduct voluntary mass DNA screening of MI6 employees.

He said police needed to ensure "all areas of his life were fully explored."

Daily Herald (UT) : UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer says spies will be asked to give DNA samples in a bid to solve the mystery of an agent whose body was found padlocked inside a sports bag in his bathtub.

Last week an inquest concluded that Gareth Williams had probably been killed by another person in a "criminally meditated act."

Coroner Fiona Wilcox was critical of the MI6 spy agency, which failed to pass evidence to investigating police.

Williams, 31, worked for Britain's GCHQ eavesdropping service. He was attached to MI6 when his remains were found in August 2010.

Metropolitan Police Commisioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said Tuesday that detectives would conduct voluntary mass DNA screening of MI6 employees.

He said police needed to ensure "all areas of his life were fully explored."

This Is London : Mass DNA tests for MI6 agents over death of spy Gareth Williams

Mass DNA tests for MI6 agents over death of spy Gareth Williams

May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer warned MI6 it
is not above the law as he revealed proposals for mass DNA screenings in the
long-running Gareth Williams investigation.

An independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into how the codebreaker's body ended up in a holdall, Scotland Yard's Commissioner said.

Bernard Hogan-Howe has also told detectives to deal directly with the intelligence agency in a break with tradition at the Metropolitan Police.

Homicide detectives were previously forced to involve counter-terror colleagues in a bid to obtain statements and evidence from MI6.

But Mr Hogan-Howe was angered by the "unacceptable" breakdown in communication which saw evidence fail to come to the senior investigating officer until last week at an inquest.

When asked what powers he had to ensure MI6 co-operated, he told reporters: "It's the law."

He said mass screening in the case would be carried out on a "voluntary" basis.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: "Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams' death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored."

Mr Hogan-Howe said forensics firm LGC, which was responsible for a mix-up early in the investigation, would not be in charge of the review.

But he added: "This is not about criticising the forensic system."

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who has led the investigation since the body was found in August 2010, is likely to pass on the case to a colleague because she is being promoted.

Members of the secret services have come under fresh scrutiny after the coroner at last week's inquest said she was sure a third party locked Mr Williams inside the red holdall in which his naked body was found in his bathtub.

Giving her verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old was probably killed and it "remained a legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services may have been involved in the death.

But inquiries have yet to yield a culprit, with forensic experts still hoping for a breakthrough from DNA tests on a green towel discovered in his kitchen.

Mr Williams, a fitness enthusiast originally from Anglesey, North Wales, was found in the bag in his flat in Pimlico, central London.

ITN : Mass DNA screenings planned for MI6

Mass DNA screenings planned for MI6

© REUTERS | May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer has warned MI6 it is not above the law as he revealed proposals for mass DNA screenings in the long-running investigation into the death of spy Gareth Williams.

Scotland Yard's Commissioner said an independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into how the codebreaker's body ended up in a holdall.

Bernard Hogan-How has been angered by the "unacceptable" breakdown in communication between the security services and the police, which saw evidence fail to come to the senior investigating officer until last week at an inquest.

He said mass screening in the case would be carried out on a "voluntary" basis.

Following the inquest into Gareth Williams' death, members of the secret services have come under fresh scrutiny.

Giving her verdict at the inquest last week, coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old was probably killed and it "remained a legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services may have been involved in the death.

But inquiries have yet to yield a culprit, with forensic experts still hoping for a breakthrough from DNA tests on a green towel discovered in his kitchen.

LBC : MI6 Staff Could Face Mass DNA Testing

MI6 Staff Could Face Mass DNA Testing

May 8, 2012

A independent forensic review could see mass DNA testing of MI6 workers - as part of the ongoing investigation into the death of spy Gareth Williams in Pimlico.

The MET Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan Howe has warned MI6 it is not above the law - and says the screenings may involve a few or many members of the intelligence service.

Last week a coronor ruled the 31-year-old - found dead inside a locked holdall in his flat - was probably killed unlawfully.

Grantham Journal : Warning to MI6 over spy death probe

Warning to MI6 over spy death probe

May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer has warned MI6 it is not above the law as he revealed proposals for mass DNA screenings in the long-running investigation into the death of Gareth Williams in central London.

An independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into how the codebreaker's body ended up in a holdall, Scotland Yard's Commissioner said.

Bernard Hogan-Howe has also told detectives to deal directly with the intelligence agency in a break with tradition at the Metropolitan Police.

Homicide detectives were previously forced to involve counter-terror colleagues in a bid to obtain statements and evidence from MI6.

But Mr Hogan-Howe was angered by the "unacceptable" breakdown in communication which saw evidence fail to come to the senior investigating officer until last week at an inquest.

When asked what powers he had to ensure MI6 co-operated, he told reporters: "It's the law." He said mass screening in the case would be carried out on a "voluntary" basis.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: "Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams' death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored."

Members of the secret services have came under fresh scrutiny after the coroner at last week's inquest said she was sure a third party locked Mr Williams inside the red holdall in which his naked body was found in his bathtub.

Giving her verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old was probably killed and it "remained a legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services may have been involved in the death.

Mr Williams, a fitness enthusiast originally from Anglesey, North Wales, was found in the bag in his flat in Pimlico in August 2010.

Copyright (c) Press Association Ltd. 2012, All Rights Reserved.

Telegraph : Police consider mass DNA screening of secret agents in hunt for spy in bag 'killer'.

Police consider mass DNA screening of secret agents in hunt for spy in bag 'killer'.

MI6 agents could be asked to volunteer DNA as part of a renewed bid to discover how Gareth Williams died, the head of the Metropolitan Police confirmed yesterday.

By Martin Evans, Crime Correspondent | May 8, 2012

Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said the force was considering a mass screening programme among the spy’s colleagues at the Secret Intelligence Service.

But he stressed that without an official suspect in the case, they could not compel anyone to take part in a DNA screening programme.

Last week the coroner at Mr Williams’ inquest said the 31-year-old, whose naked, decomposing remains were found in a locked sports holdall, had probably been killed unlawfully by a mystery third party.

Dr Fiona Wilcox also raised the prospect that another spy may have been involved in his death, remarking that it was a “legitimate line of inquiry” for police.

Asked if he expected MI6 personnel to co-operate in the investigation, Mr Hogan-Howe said: “It’s called the law.”

The Met Commissioner also said a new independent forensics review would be launched in order to see if anything had been missed in the initial investigation.

Mr Williams' inquest heard how forensic scientists had found minute traces of DNA inside the apartment, but were unable to match them to a third party.

But the hearing was also told how weeks of investigative work were wasted, trying to find a match for a DNA trace found on the back of Mr Williams’ hand.

It later emerged that sample in fact belonged to one of the forensic scientists working on the case.

The forensics review will be carried out by a private firm, who were not involved in the original investigation.

Last week Dr Wilcox also voiced concern over the way potentially vital information was withheld from the Senior Investigating Officer (SIO) in the case, Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire.

Due to the sensitivity of Mr Williams’ work, interviews with SIS agents were conducted by members of the SO15 counter-terrorism unit and then passed to detectives.

But Mr Hogan-Howe said SO15 would now be taken off the case in order to remove the unnecessary “extra-layer” of investigators.

Mr Hogan-Howe said he believed problems that had occurred were the result of “miscommunication”, rather than a “mischief”, but said he expected the SIO to have direct access to all relevant information and witnesses.

The review of the case, which was demanded by Mr Williams’ family, is to be led by Hamish Campbell, head of the Met’s Homicide unit.

DCI Sebire, who was praised for her efforts by the family and the coroner, is likely to pass the case onto a colleague after being promoted.

Financial Times : MI6 screening considered in dead spy case

MI6 screening considered in dead spy case

By Helen Warrell and James Blitz

A Scotland Yard review of all the forensic evidence in the case of dead spy Gareth Williams may involve a DNA screening programme of MI6 employees, the Metropolitan Police commissioner said on Tuesday.

Bernard Hogan-Howe told reporters that from now on, the senior investigating officer would be able to approach MI6 personnel directly, without an anti-terrorism officer working as an intermediary.

Homicide detectives were previously forced to involve counter-terrorism colleagues in an attempt to obtain statements and evidence from MI6 as part of their investigation into Williams’s death.

When asked whether MI6 had agreed to greater access by the police team, the commissioner said: “They don’t have to sign up to it. It’s called the law.”

An inquest into the death of Williams – a talented codebreaker whose body was found zipped inside a locked holdall at his London flat in August 2010 – concluded that he was probably unlawfully killed.

Although the investigation leading up to the inquest did not identify any suspects, forensic teams have still not found a match for DNA found on a green towel in the spy’s kitchen.

The Met commissioner said that a screening programme on MI6 employees was one option under consideration, though he stressed this would be carried out on a “voluntary” basis.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: “Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams’s death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored.’’

However, he criticised an “unacceptable” breakdown in communication over potential evidence, which emerged during the inquest into Williams’s death, which concluded last week.

He said the senior investigating officer (SIO) would in future have complete access to all MI6 material, after it emerged a counter-terrorism officer did not tell the SIO, Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, about potential evidence.

Members of MI6 came under fresh scrutiny after the coroner at last week’s inquest said she was sure a third party locked Williams inside the red holdall in which his naked body was found in his bathtub.

Giving her verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old was probably killed and it “remained a legitimate line of inquiry’’ that the secret services might have been involved in the death.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2012.

Chippewa (WI) Herald : UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

Associated Press | May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer says spies will be asked to give DNA samples in a bid to solve the mystery of an agent whose body was found padlocked inside a sports bag in his bathtub.

Last week an inquest concluded that Gareth Williams had probably been killed by another person in a "criminally meditated act."

Coroner Fiona Wilcox was critical of the MI6 spy agency, which failed to pass evidence to investigating police.

Williams, 31, worked for Britain's GCHQ eavesdropping service. He was attached to MI6 when his remains were found in August 2010.

Metropolitan Police Commisioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said Tuesday that detectives would conduct voluntary mass DNA screening of MI6 employees.

He said police needed to ensure "all areas of his life were fully explored."

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Miami Herald : UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

The Associated Press | May 8, 2012

LONDON -- Britain's top police officer says spies will be asked to give DNA samples in a bid to solve the mystery of an agent whose body was found padlocked inside a sports bag in his bathtub.

Last week an inquest concluded that Gareth Williams had probably been killed by another person in a "criminally meditated act."

Coroner Fiona Wilcox was critical of the MI6 spy agency, which failed to pass evidence to investigating police.

Williams, 31, worked for Britain's GCHQ eavesdropping service. He was attached to MI6 when his remains were found in August 2010.

Metropolitan Police Commisioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said Tuesday that detectives would conduct voluntary mass DNA screening of MI6 employees.

He said police needed to ensure "all areas of his life were fully explored."

Guardian : Gareth Williams: Met orders forensic review

Gareth Williams: Met orders forensic review

Met commissioner says new evidence will be examined and warns MI6 officers to co-operate with police

Vikram Dodd | May 8, 2012

Scotland Yard has ordered a review of forensic evidence as it renews its efforts to solve the death of MI6 officer Gareth Williams.

The Scotland Yard commissioner, Bernard Hogan-Howe, said MI6 employees would be expected to co-operate with police. "It's called the law," said Britain's top police officer.

An inquest last week found Williams, whose body was found stuffed in a holdall in a London flat, may have been killed. It also heard police were not told of evidence held by the spy agency, including memory sticks, until last week.

Hogan-Howe said the new material that has emerged would be examined. He also said detectives from the Met's homicide command will interview MI6 employees directly, without the need to go through counter-terrorism officers.

Hogan-Howe said it was possible MI6 employees may be asked to undergo fresh DNA tests.

The commissioner said a new private company would re-examine the forensics in the investigation. He did not name the company but said it implied no criticism of the firm that originally carried out the work.

Gazette Live : Warning to MI6 over spy death probe

Warning to MI6 over spy death probe

May 8, 2012

Britain's top police officer has warned MI6 it is not above the law as he revealed proposals for mass DNA screenings in the long-running Gareth Williams investigation.

An independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into how the codebreaker's body ended up in a holdall, Scotland Yard's Commissioner said.

Bernard Hogan-Howe has also told detectives to deal directly with the intelligence agency in a break with tradition at the Metropolitan Police. Homicide detectives were previously forced to involve counter-terror colleagues in a bid to obtain statements and evidence from MI6.

But Mr Hogan-Howe was angered by the "unacceptable" breakdown in communication which saw evidence fail to come to the senior investigating officer until last week at an inquest. When asked what powers he had to ensure MI6 co-operated, he told reporters: "It's the law."

He said mass screening in the case would be carried out on a "voluntary" basis.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: "Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams' death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored."

Mr Hogan-Howe said forensics firm LGC, which was responsible for a mix-up early in the investigation, would not be in charge of the review. But he added: "This is not about criticising the forensic system."

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who has led the investigation since the body was found in August 2010, is likely to pass on the case to a colleague because she is being promoted.

Members of the secret services have came under fresh scrutiny after the coroner at last week's inquest said she was sure a third party locked Mr Williams inside the red holdall in which his naked body was found in his bathtub.

Giving her verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said the 31-year-old, originally from Anglesey, North Wales, was probably killed and it "remained a legitimate line of inquiry" that the secret services may have been involved in the death. But inquiries have yet to yield a culprit, with forensic experts still hoping for a breakthrough from DNA tests on a green towel discovered in his kitchen.

Mercury News : UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

UK police to take DNA from spies in body probe

The Associated Press | May 8, 2012

LONDON — Britain's top police officer says spies will be asked to give DNA samples in a bid to solve the mystery of an agent whose body was found padlocked inside a sports bag in his bathtub.

Last week an inquest concluded that Gareth Williams had probably been killed by another person in a "criminally meditated act."

Coroner Fiona Wilcox was critical of the MI6 spy agency, which failed to pass evidence to investigating police.

Williams, 31, worked for Britain's GCHQ eavesdropping service. He was attached to MI6 when his remains were found in August 2010.

Metropolitan Police Commisioner Bernard Hogan-Howe said Tuesday that detectives would conduct voluntary mass DNA screening of MI6 employees.

He said police needed to ensure "all areas of his life were fully explored."

BBC : Profile: MI6 spy Gareth Williams

Profile: MI6 spy Gareth Williams

May 8, 2012

The inquest into the death of MI6 employee Gareth Williams, whose body was found in a padlocked sports bag in his central London flat in August 2010, found that he was "on the balance of probabilities" unlawfully killed.

But what is known about the 31-year-old code-breaker - described by his family as "a very private person"?

Mr Williams, originally from Holyhead, north Wales, worked as a communications officer at government listening post GCHQ, in Cheltenham, but was on a three-year secondment to MI6 in London.

Police officers went to his MI6-owned top-floor flat at 36 Alderney Street - in a part of Pimlico described by a neighbour as "a very mixed area of bankers and politicians" - on Monday 23 August.

They went there after colleagues contacted the police earlier that day saying they had not seen Mr Williams for at least 10 days.

They found his naked body, which had been padlocked inside a zipped-up large red North Face sports holdall, in the empty bath of an ensuite bathroom of the master bedroom.

Police, who have repeatedly said the death remains "suspicious and unexplained", now believe he died in the early hours of Tuesday 16 August.

Mr Williams, a keen cyclist who often took part in road races and time trials, was brought up on the island of Anglesey and attended Bodedern High School.

A talented pupil, he graduated from Bangor University with a first class degree in maths aged 17 after beginning his university studies while at secondary school.

His maths teacher at Bodedern, Geraint Williams, has praised Gareth as an "exceptional" pupil who was "the best logician" he had met.

"If you explained something once to Gareth he remembered it, you didn't have to explain it again," he said.

"It didn't surprise me at all that he was very interested in codes and ciphers and it didn't really surprise me that he was recruited by GCHQ.

"He was definitely going to go into something like that, with his brain."

'Loving son'

Mr Williams went on to study for a postgraduate certificate in mathematics at St Catharine's College, Cambridge, in 2000, but dropped out a year later before taking up the job at GCHQ in Cheltenham.

His boss there has spoken of him as a "world-class" intelligence officer and "something of a prodigy".

Stephen Gale said it was "quite remarkable" that Mr Williams - who joined GCHQ aged 21 - had achieved what he had at such a young age.

Mr Gale said: "Colleagues recall a young man who was very close to his father - he spoke about their climbing trips together.

"They remember him as a keen cyclist. One colleague said it was like a red bullet flying around the place."

In the days after his death, his family described Mr Williams in a statement as a "generous, loving son, brother, and friend" whose loss had devastated them.

They remembered him as "a great athlete" who "loved cycling and music", and as "a very private person".

He often returned home to Anglesey to mother Ellen and father Ian, who works at the Wylfa Nuclear Power Station.

Keith Thompson, of Holyhead Cycling Club - joined by Mr Williams at the age of 17 - said he had last seen the "lovely young man" at a club meeting on Boxing Day.

"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," he said.

And a cyclist at Cambridge University's bicycle club described Mr Williams as "a shy chap" with a "peculiarly memorable laugh and smile".

Mr Williams' uncle, Anglesey councillor William Hughes, meanwhile, said his "very talented" nephew "would never talk about his work - and the family knew not to ask, really".

A neighbour in Pimlico said he and others had never seen Mr Williams, adding: "It's not like you'd tell your neighbours if you were a spy."

Police 'did wrong'

In late December 2010, police revealed some "embarrassing, hurtful and distressing" details about Mr Williams which they said was necessary in the search for evidence.

They said he owned £15,000-worth of unworn women's designer clothing, which were kept in six boxes at his flat, and that he had visited a drag cabaret in east London four days before his death and had tickets to two more.

Police said he occasionally spent between 30 minutes and an hour on bondage sites.

They also said a witness had reported seeing him in a gay bar but that they did not know for certain he was gay.

However, in April 2011 Mr Williams' close friend Sian Lloyd-Jones questioned suggestions his death was linked to his private life and called on police to broaden their inquiry.

She told the police "did wrong" by releasing information about women's clothing "but didn't reveal that there was £10,000 of mountaineering equipment as well".

Ms Lloyd-Jones said he was not gay and the women's clothes were too small for him and may have been intended for her or her sister.

Elizabeth Guthrie - the second friend to appear before the coroner - described her friendship with Mr Williams as based on their mutual love of history, art, Japanese Manga cartoons, travel and humorous anecdotes.

Ms Guthrie remembered his "brilliant sense of humour" and "enormous intellect".

She also said the women's clothing found by police "certainly would not be for him" - that he had no interest in cross-dressing and she believed he was "straight".

Mr Williams' sister, Ceri Subbe, said she believed the items of women's clothing were possibly intended as gifts.

She also told the inquest her brother's enthusiasm about his job had begun to fade.

"He disliked office culture, post-work drinks, flash car competitions and the rat race. He even spoke of friction in the office," her statement said.

Ms Subbe added that Mr Williams had "encountered more red tape than he was comfortable with" in his role.

The inquest into the death of the MI6 officer later heard he was once found tied to his bed by his former landlady in Cheltenham.

Jennifer Elliot said she once found him tied to his bedstead in his boxer shorts in what she thought was a "sexually motivated" act. She said he had called for help when he could not untie himself.

'Dark arts'

Mr Williams returned to his flat - half a mile from MI6 headquarters on the banks of the River Thames - on Wednesday 11 August 2010 after a fly-drive holiday to the west coast of the US.

Police say he had been shopping in London's West End and Knightsbridge areas a number of times since then.

CCTV images captured on Saturday 14 August showed him entering Holland Park tube station at about 1500 BST.

On Sunday 15 August, he went to Harrods after visiting a cash machine and, at about 1430 BST, CCTV images showed him in Hans Crescent, heading towards Sloane Street, near the Dolce & Gabbana store.

A post-mortem examination and toxicology tests - which found no trace of drugs, alcohol or poison - and the police investigation have all failed to establish a cause of death.

Police believe that Mr Williams, whose family think may have been killed by an agent "specialising in the dark arts of the secret services", was helped into the bag.

Coroner Fiona Wilcox said it was unlikely he got into the bag by himself but doubted his death would ever be explained.

BBC : MI6 staff 'may face DNA screening over spy death'

MI6 staff 'may face DNA screening over spy death'

May 8, 2012

MI6 staff may have samples of their DNA checked following the death of MI6 officer Gareth Williams, the head of the Metropolitan Police has confirmed.

Bernard Hogan-Howe also demanded that MI6 give "unrestricted access" to detectives for the first time, as Scotland Yard reinvestigate the case.

The naked body of Mr Williams, 31, from Anglesey, was found locked in a bag in a bath in his London flat in 2010.

A coroner has concluded that he was probably unlawfully killed.

She also said she doubted whether Mr Williams' death would ever be explained, saying that "fundamental questions" remained unanswered.

Mr Hogan-Howe said any screening of staff at MI6 would be voluntary and could involve a few MI6 officers, or many.

A number of DNA samples were taken during the previous investigation.

Mr Hogan-Howe said: "Of course it may well be that Gareth Williams' death has nothing to do with employment. All we need to do is to make sure that all areas of his life were fully explored."

When asked if MI6 had agreed to grant new levels of access, Mr Hogan-Howe said they didn't have to: "It's called the law."

He criticised an "unacceptable" breakdown in communication over potential evidence, which emerged during the inquest.

Memory sticks

He said the senior investigating officer (SIO) would in future have complete access to all MI6 material, after it emerged a counter-terrorism officer did not tell the SIO, Det Ch Insp Jackie Sebire, about potential evidence.

He has told detectives to deal directly with the intelligence agency, in a break with tradition at the force.

Scotland Yard detectives are normally required to involve counter-terror colleagues at SO15 to obtain statements and evidence from MI6.

Det Con Colin Hall from SO15 searched Mr Williams' MI6 office on 26 August 2010, but did not seize computer memory sticks because he was told they contained material "of a sensitive nature".

A North Face bag similar to the one in which Mr Williams was found, was allegedly withheld by secret-service officers.

Mrs Sebire, who has led the investigation since the body was found, is soon likely to pass on the case to a colleague because she is being promoted.

Speaking last week, she said it was "highly likely" that a third party was involved in Mr Williams's death, and urged anyone who knew him to come forward with any information.

An independent forensics review will form a central part of fresh efforts to solve the 21-month inquiry into Mr Williams's death, the commissioner said.

Forensics firm LGC, which was responsible for a mix-up early in the investigation, would not be in charge of the independent review.

But Mr Hogan-Howe added: "This is not about criticising the forensic system."
Green towel

Mr Williams was not reported missing by his bosses at MI6 until a week after he was last seen, and the post-mortem examination was not carried out until nine days after he died.

A small amount of "unexplained" DNA was found on the zip toggle and padlock of the red holdall, containing his curled-up body.

Forensic experts are still hoping for a breakthrough from DNA tests on a green towel discovered in his kitchen.

Three pathologists who conducted post-mortem examinations were unable to reach a firm conclusion on how Mr Williams died, because his body had significantly decomposed.

But they said poisoning and asphyxiation are the foremost contenders as the cause of death.

After the inquest, MI6 chief Sir John Sawers apologised "unreservedly" to Mr Williams' family for its "failure to act more swiftly" in reporting his disappearance.

Code-breaker Mr Williams was on secondment to MI6 from the government's listening service GCHQ in Cheltenham when he died.

Mirror : 'Body in the bag' spy death: The six key questions that must be answered at the inquest

'Body in the bag' spy death: The six key questions that must be answered at the inquest

Tom Pettifor | April 23, 2012

The inquest into MI6 spy Gareth Williams's mysterious death began today. Here are six questions that remain unanswered

Was there someone else in the flat with Gareth Williams when he died?

Police say it would have been impossible to get into the locked bag alone.

Mr Williams’s body had no signs of defence injuries from a struggle.

The flat was double locked and there was no forensic evidence of a third party.

Why did it take so long to raise the alarm?

Mr Williams was last seen on August 15, 2010, and police believe he died in the early hours of the following day.

But he was not reported missing by anyone until his sister rang police seven days later.

Were the dark arts of the spooks involved?

His family suspect members of an intelligence service were involved in what they see as a possible murder and cover-up.

Was Mr Williams being followed?

A friend is said to have told police he had told her he feared he was under surveillance.

But he did not reveal by whom.

Was Mr Williams’s work behind his death?

He had just returned from holiday in the United States but neither MI6 nor GCHQ have wanted to make public what the codebreaker was involved in at the time of his death.

Did a sex game go wrong?

There was no trace of alcohol or recreational drugs in his body.

But if he was interested in auto-eroticism why was it not picked up when he was vetted?

Guardian : The beguiling power of mystery that can make us forget a family's pain

The beguiling power of mystery that can make us forget a family's pain/

Our desire for life to be dramatic can lead us to merge real-life stories such as the death of Gareth Williams into fiction

Henry Porter | The Observer | May 6, 2012

The obvious, though almost entirely forgotten, truth about the deaths of the SIS cryptanalyst Gareth Williams and the British businessman Neil Heywood is that they were loved by their families and friends and this grief is no less than any of us would suffer.

But this barely registers when the public scents a real-life thriller – the appetite for intrigue and mystery quickly trumps any respect for the bereaved as we marvel at the artfulness of fate. Either the news is becoming more like thrillers or thriller writers are people of exceptional prescience who have somehow fracked the drama out of modern times with new precision.

In the Williams and Heywood deaths, it's really striking how they comply with the laws of mystery writing and, without changing a single detail, these exact circumstances could easily have been written into serviceable fiction.

In the Heywood murder, we have a police chief who takes refuge in the American consulate after alleging the murder; Heywood's main patron, an ambitious Maoist governor, destined for the top; and his wife, who is alleged to have had an affair with Heywood and who is also known to have imported hot air balloons from Somerset, as a means to conceal the illegal transfer of cash from China.

Like the Williams case, where the brilliant young victim was found locked into a red holdall, it is all too bizarre, much richer and more extravagant than most mystery writers have the capacity to imagine. Yet conventions are respected. In both stories, there is an unexplained death of a man who is engaged on secret, or at least highly secretive, work and who expires out of context – the old Harrovian Heywood was in China and Williams was killed in an anonymous flat in London, away from his home patch of Cheltenham. We are struck by their isolation and the lonely terror of their final moments, though to dwell on this is far from entertaining.

In both cases, families, colleagues and the authorities were slow to realise what had happened and it took time to establish that Williams and Heywood had in fact been killed. There were different degrees of cover-up in both stories and these suggest hinterlands of corruption and intrigue in Chinese and British authorities. We have no idea why these two apparently blameless individuals were murdered, exactly how they met their deaths or what was – or still is – at stake. In fiction, the whole thing would be wrapped up in under 500 pages by a heroically flawed, and therefore lovable, protagonist, who solves the murder and, by the by, exposes the conspiracy.

Here, the real world and fiction part company, because in neither case is there likely to be a completely satisfactory solution. Gareth Williams and Neil Heywood will be memorialised in headlines about the manner of their deaths (Spy in the Bag, Death in a Hotel Room), not by loving epitaphs. Life is rarely as neat or as just as fiction.

Yet there's good evidence that we desire a merger, or overlap, of reality and the fictive world – a demand for narrative in the news and a requirement that the works of the imagination should be based, as the movies say, on actual events. We want life to be melodramatic, because, despite impressions to the contrary and the hysteria of the war on terror, most human existence in the west today is peaceful and humdrum and bears out the theory in Steven Pinker's book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, that violence in history is in steady decline.

However, modern societies are beautifully set up to meet the plot demands of a thriller. We communicate with each other incessantly; we are at all times watched and photographed and traceable; and we move around a lot and are often far from home. (Incidentally, when I hear the words "a British businessman", my Pavlovian response is to expect trouble, as in any of the following verbs – murdered, jailed, extradited or disappeared.)

Reality has obliged us with high-concept melodrama, inconveniencing many a writer of hard-boiled dialogue and diabolic scenarios. "You couldn't make it up" is the phrase that springs to our lips as we contemplate jetliners piling into skyscrapers, US Navy Seals snuffing out Osama bin Laden – with the president and secretary of state on the other end of the live feed from Seal head cams – and the chief of the IMF ruling himself out of today's French presidential election by molesting a maid in a New York hotel that was miraculously wired for compromise.

You couldn't make it up, nor would you. As a writer of espionage fiction, I am not sure I would have dared to imagine Anna Chapman and the herds of Russian spies, grazing in America's suburbs and communicating with each other's laptops by coded wireless transmissions, while – and here is the bizarre and unimaginable part – conveying very little useful information to their spymasters in Moscow Centre. I would not have made up MI6's phony rock with its secret compartment, lying in a Moscow park, because it seems exactly like something a thriller writer would make up.

That story may provide a hint of what is going on. Not long after 9/11, I was on a book tour in Canada with a female novelist, who made a persuasive case that thriller writers had corrupted the imagination of mankind by enabling evil men such as Bin Laden to act out their extravagant fantasies. The constant drip of conspiracy and demonic plotting had changed us for the worse, she argued, rather like porn distorts sexual behaviour.

The first proper thriller writer was Erskine Childers, who in 1903 published Riddle of the Sands, a novel slightly less thrilling than Childers's own life, which was ended by a firing squad in 1922. But not before he shook hands with its members and told them: "Take a step or two forward, lads – it'll be easier that way." It was as though Childers had jumped out of one of his own novels. There was a confusion of author and character; his fiction was somehow decreeing how his life should end.

Ever since then, writers of intrigue have also been participants in the great game (Maugham, Buchan, Fleming, Greene, le Carré) and have benefited hugely from their experience.

Those who do not have that time in the trenches take care to stand close to power and politics and it would be odd if, over the course of a century of this relationship, some kind of exchange did not occur.

Daily Mail : Did spy-in-bag killer slip back into flat through skylight to cover his tracks? New theory emerges over MI6 codebreaker death

Did spy-in-bag killer slip back into flat through skylight to cover his tracks? New theory emerges over MI6 codebreaker death

* Theory rival spy 'trained in the dark arts of the secret services' murdered British agent
* Mystery of second mobile phone containing video of victim dancing naked in nothing but cowboy boots

By Daniel Miller | May 6, 2012

Detectives investigating the mysterious death of the body-in-the-bag spy believe a killer could have slipped back into his flat through a skylight to cover his tracks, it has been claimed.

MI6 codebreaker Gareth Williams was found dead in his London flat in 2010. A coroner ruled that he was 'probably killed illegally and his family remain convinced he was the victim of a rival agent.

Many close to the case believe he was assassinated by a spy working for foreign powers because of his work for MI6 and the US National Security Agency.

Speculation over the exact nature of his work has been growing since Foreign Secretary William Hague signed a public interest in order to stop details being released on security grounds.

It has been claimed that MI6 and the government eavesdropping centre GCHQ, to which Williams was attached, have been working on a computer virus designed to disrupt Iran's nuclear programme.

Questions are also being asked as to how MI6 came into possession of a second iPhone belonging to Mr Williams when Police found only one at his flat.

The agency handed over the mobile containing a video of Mr Williams dancing naked except for a pair of cowboy boots after his death was discovered.

However MI6 workers are forbidden from taking their personal phones into work and experts believe it is unlikely Williams would have risked bringing in a phone containing such a video.

Curiously the iPhone discovered by police searching the flat had been completely wiped of all memory.

Investigators are now believed to be working on a theory that the second phone was taken from the flat after Williams died but before police conducted a thorough search of the property.

MI6 regulations mean efforts are made to contact any employees who do not arrive at work by 10pm, yet Mr Williams' disappearance was not reported for eight days.

Another irregularity was the fact that heating in the flat had been turned up full blast - possibly because it would have accelerated the rate at which the body decomposed - helping to destroy any evidence.

The Sunday Mirror newspaper reports an intelligence source as saying: 'It's never been mentioned that there is a skylight but it was pretty clear to a lot of people in the case that there was no better way for the killer to get back into the flat.

'They could have come back to clean up the crime scene and got in through the skylight while police were outside.

'Of course, if MI6 were involved in his death that is one explanation for how they managed to get his phone.'

Anthony O'Toole, a barrister representing the family, has suggested that Gareth could have been killed by someone who specialises in 'the dark arts of the secret services.'

Coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox said the theory that Mr Williams was killed by a spy was 'legitimate line of inquiry'.

She has questioned the motives of those who leaked details about Mr Williams's private life, including his visits to bondage websites. His family say the visits could have been work-related.

Police wasted time on false leads generated by the leaks. Reports that Mr Williams went to gay bars in the Vauxhall area of London, and visited websites on sadomasochism and claustrophilia – the sexual pleasure of confined spaces – proved to be false.

Dr Wilcox said Mr Williams was not a transvestite and that his collection of £20,000 of unworn women's clothes were probably gifts for friends.

She said the cause of death was unnatural and likely to have been criminally mediated' and dismissed claims that Mr Williams had entered the sports bag seeking sexual gratification.

The coroner said: 'I wonder what the motive was for the release of this material to the media. I wonder whether this was an attempt by a third party to intimate a sexual motive.'

Daily Star : COPS ‘WILL SOLVE’ SPY IN BAG DEATH

COPS ‘WILL SOLVE’ SPY IN BAG DEATH

May 6, 2012

POLICE have vowed to solve the mystery surrounding the death of the “spy in the bag” amid claims of a Secret Service cover-up.

Detectives are convinced MI6 spies are not telling all they know about Gareth Williams, 31, who was found naked in a padlocked holdall two years ago.

Scotland Yard’s Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire has the backing of Britain’s top cop, Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe, to force them to come clean.

They have even threatened to drag in Foreign Secretary William Hague, who is overseer of MI6.

Spooks believe Mr Williams was either killed by a Russian or Chinese spy trying to turn him into a double agent, or that he died during a bizarre sex game that was part of his personal life that failed to show up in vigorous vetting.

A police insider said: “Scotland Yard will not give this up without a fight.”

Daily Mail : Scotland Yard investigates transvestite smear against spy Gareth, but no disciplinary action will be taken

Scotland Yard investigates transvestite smear against spy Gareth, but no disciplinary action will be taken

May 6, 2012

Detectives have investigated allegations that police smeared MI6 spy Gareth Williams – but have ruled out taking disciplinary action against any officer.

Scotland Yard's internal investigation unit examined claims that officers leaked information which led to false media reports that Gareth Williams was a transvestite who was the victim of a sex game that went wrong.

The leaks shifted attention from the spy's work with MI6 and GCHQ, the Government's secret listening station, to his private life.

Last night, the Met confirmed its team had ruled out disciplining any officer over the leaks.

In 2010, Mr Williams's family complained to officers they were learning more about the investigation from newspaper reports rather than from police briefings.

Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, who is leading the investigation into Mr Williams's death, told his inquest last week that the leaks diverted resources from genuine lines of inquiry.

The spy's body was found on August 23, 2010, locked inside a holdall which was placed in the bath at his home in Pimlico, Central London. The victim had last been seen by his colleagues ten days earlier.

Last week, coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox questioned the motives of those who leaked details about Mr Williams's private life, including his visits to bondage websites. His family say the visits could have been work-related.

Dr Wilcox said Mr Williams was not a transvestite and that his collection of £20,000 of unworn women's clothes were probably gifts for friends.

She also dismissed claims that Mr Williams had entered the sports bag seeking sexual gratification.

The coroner said: 'I wonder what the motive was for the release of this material to the media. I wonder whether this was an attempt by a third party to intimate a sexual motive.'

Scotland Yard's internal investigations unit was asked to look at the leaks after concerns were expressed by Det Chief Insp Sebire.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: 'Concerns were raised that information relating to the investigation had been placed in the public domain.

The force initiated an exercise to assess the concerns. A decision was taken not to proceed further.'

Police wasted time on false leads generated by the leaks. Reports that Mr Williams went to gay bars in the Vauxhall area of London, and visited websites on sadomasochism and claustrophilia – the sexual pleasure of confined spaces – proved to be false.

Det Chief Insp Sebire told the inquest that she had seen at first-hand the
distress the leaks had caused the Williams family, but insisted: 'They did not come from my team.'

A senior police source said that suspicions surrounding the source of the leaks initially centred on counter-terrorism police officers and MI6.

Last night a Whitehall spokesman denied MI6 was responsible for the smears but declined to say whether the Service was also investigating the claims.

A memo released to the inquest revealed that senior officials at GCHQ, where Mr Williams spent most of his career, were concerned about the leaks.

Last night, a GCHQ spokesman declined to comment on the memo or any investigation into the leaks.

MI6 and GCHQ were criticised by the coroner for waiting more than a week before raising the alarm about Mr Williams's absence.

Dr Wilcox also hit out at counter-terrorism officers who liaised with MI6 and GCHQ, and police officers investigating the spy's death.

She said evidence that could have helped the inquiry was only passed to detectives once the inquest was in its second week.

Last week it was revealed that police are planning to take DNA samples from up to 50 spies.

Dr Wilcox said the possibility that another spy was involved in Mr Williams's death was a 'legitimate line of inquiry'.

At the end of the inquest, Mr Williams's family criticised SO15, the Met's counter-terrorism branch, for the 'total inadequacies' of its investigation into MI6.

The family said: 'Our grief is exacerbated by the failure of MI6 to make even the most basic inquiries as to Gareth's whereabouts and welfare.

'We are also extremely disappointed at the reluctance and failure of MI6 to make available relevant information.'

NOLA : Naked spy died at hands of mystery killer, British coroner says

Naked spy died at hands of mystery killer, British coroner says

The Associated Press | May 5, 2012

LONDON -- Even after a coroner's verdict, it remains a mystery: A naked spy found dead in a locked bag, lurid details of a kinky sex life and allegations that someone in Britain's spy agencies may have been involved in his death.

A British coroner ruled Wednesday that another person was likely involved in Gareth Williams' death -- a finding that puts more pressure on police to uncover the cyberwarfare expert's killer and continue to investigate possibilities that include whether he could have died in a sex game gone awry or in a more sinister scenario that involved his counterterrorism work.

In Britain, coroners are asked to investigate unexplained deaths, and their findings can often carry weight as police investigations proceed.

Although Coroner Fiona Wilcox said it was unlikely that the death of Williams, 31, will ever be "satisfactorily explained," she said the spy was likely killed either by suffocation or poisoning in a "criminally meditated act." She also said it was possible that someone from one of Britain's spy agencies was involved.

Williams, described as an introverted math genius, worked for Britain's secret eavesdropping service GCHQ. But he was attached to the MI6 foreign spy agency when his remains were found in the bathtub at his London apartment on Aug. 16, 2010, just a few days after returning from a trip to the United States.

Forensic experts found about 20,000 thousand pounds, or $32,000, worth of luxury women's clothing, shoes and wigs in his apartment. Police also discovered that he had visited bondage and sadomasochism websites, including some related to claustrophilia -- a desire for confinement in enclosed spaces.

William's landlord testified during the coroner's hearing that she once found him handcuffed to his bed. She said he had appeared embarrassed after asking for help.

Still, Wilcox said there was no immediate evidence of a sexual encounter gone wrong, of suicidal intent, or that Williams' death was linked to a supposed interest in bondage. She said, however, that tales about his sex life could have been fueled in an attempt to "manipulate the evidence."

In the past, spy recruits were often cautioned that their sex lives could make them vulnerable to blackmail.

The case has frustrated Scotland Yard detectives who have been investigating the case for 21 months now and say that the secrecy surrounding Williams' job has thwarted their efforts.

"Obviously a lot of information has come out through the course of this inquest which we have not been party to," lead detective Jackie Sebire said.

But Wilcox also criticized the police detectives.

Time and resources were wasted, she said, when forensic teams investigating a DNA sample taken from Williams's hand later turned out to belong to one of the forensic scientists. She also questioned the handling of William's iPhone, which contained deleted images of him naked in a pair of boots.

Detective Superintendent Michael Broster, who was the police liason with MI6, said he had seized it from the spy's workplace and kept it until the next day when he gave it to another officer.

"I find this is either not what occurred ... or it demonstrates disregard for the rules governing continuity of evidence," Wilcox said.

Wilcox also criticized officers who interviewed Williams' colleagues without taking any formal statements.

"I find that this did affect the quality of evidence that was heard before this court," she said.

Still, the coroner said she had seen no evidence to indicate his death was linked to his work.

When the case emerged, some had speculated that he could have been the target of Russian criminal gangs or an al-Qaida extremist. Other media reports had said there had been a break-in at the property where he lived -- a building sometimes used by MI6 to house its agents.

Wilcox said while there wasn't evidence to support a specific verdict of unlawful killing -- which would need a high burden of proof -- it was her opinion that the spy was probably unlawfully killed.

She said while it appeared unlikely, speculation that British intelligence agencies may have had a role in the death continued to be a "legitimate line of inquiry."

MI6 waited a week to investigate why Williams hadn't shown up for work -- a delay that made it difficult for Williams' family to identify his badly decomposed body.

John Sawers, the head of MI6, said in a statement following the corner's verdict that he apologized "unreservedly" to the Williams family for the spy agency's failure.

During the coroner's hearing, MI6 accepted that Williams disliked the agency's boozy culture of post-work drinking and tedious bureaucracy, and had requested to return to his job at GCHQ.

One MI6 officer claimed that Williams hadn't been reported as missing because colleagues assumed he was preparing for his return to the southern England headquarters of the eavesdropping service.

Wilcox said it appeared unlikely that Williams could have climbed inside the duffel bag and locked it himself. Two different specialists attempted to recreate the feat without success. Williams was discovered in the fetal position inside the bag with two keys to the bag's padlock underneath his buttocks.

Pathologists told the inquest that poisoning or asphyxiation may have killed Williams, but said his cadaver was too badly decomposed to be certain.

Williams' family, who have been left distraught by parts of the inquest, did not speak outside court but offered a statement.

The family, from Wales, described Williams as a "special and adored son and brother" and said they "cannot describe the depth of the sorrow his absence leaves in our lives."

The police investigation is ongoing.

By Paisley Dodds, Associated Press
David Stringer contributed to this report.

Telegraph : Could mystery fingerprints provide clue in dead spy case?

Could mystery fingerprints provide clue in dead spy case?

Police are still to identify up to 20 sets of fingerprints found in the flat of dead MI6 spy Gareth Williams, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.

By Tom Whitehead, Security Editor | May 5, 2012

Some of the potential prints are little more than marks or “smudges” but officers hope they could still hold the key to the maths prodigy’s death.

Forensic officers are still examining them along with traces of DNA found on a towel in the kitchen.

It came as the head of the Met’s homicide squad said he believed the bizarre death could still be solved despite few clues after a two-year investigation.

Officers are preparing to return to MI6 to interview colleagues of Mr Williams and take DNA as part of a review of the case.

It followed criticism by a coroner this week over aspects of the investigation and the way some evidence was handled.

Mr Williams’ naked decomposing body was discovered in a padlocked sports bag in the bath of his Pimlico home in London in August 2010.

It had been there for a week without anyone raising concerns that the 31-year-old, who was on secondment to MI6 from GCHQ, had gone missing.

At the end of an eight day inquest on Wednesday, coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox said that “on the balance of probabilities” Mr Williams was “unlawfully killed” and likely to have been “criminally mediated” by a mystery third party.

A lawyer for the family has previously suggested someone expert in the “dark arts” of the secret service was linked to the death.

Anthony O’Toole also hinted that foreign forces may have been aware the flat was being used to house MI6 officers and targeted it rather than a specific agenda against Mr Williams.

During the inquest, DCI Jackie Sebire, who is leading the investigation, said more than 300 fingerprints were found around the flat.

The majority of those have been accounted for but police sources revealed around 20 are still unresolved.

Some may prove to be too weak to be of use while others may still turn out to be entirely innocent, such as from a workman.

However, experts are working hard to resolve them in the hope they may throw up a mystery visitor to the flat.

Faint traces of the DNA of at least two other people were found on the bag containing Mr Williams but forensic officers fear they are too weak to ever be of use.

There is more hope surrounding DNA tests on a towel found in the kitchen which are due to be concluded within the next few weeks.

Detective Chief Superintendent Hamish Campbell, head of the Met's homicide squad, said of the riddle: “I think it can be resolved and DCI Sebire has my full support.

“We will make every effort to do that, will review the investigation and follow up lines.”

The Daily Telegraph disclosed yesterday that MI6 fear Scotland Yard is trying to make it a scapegoat for failings in the investigation.

Tensions are growing between the intelligence services and police over a possible blame game following criticism by the coroner.

Dr Wilcox criticised the delays in spotting Mr Williams was missing and apparent failures in the handling of potential evidence.

The inquest heard how nine memory sticks that may have belonged to the codebreaker and a bag similar to the one he was found dead in were discovered his office but never handed over to the Met team that investigated his death for almost two years.

A senior Whitehall source said there was concern within the intelligence service that the police were using it as a “scapegoat” to mask their own failings in solving the mystery.

Express : What Does MI6 Have To Say About The Spy In The Bag?

WHAT DOES MI6 HAVE TO SAY ABOUT THE SPY IN THE BAG?

By James Gillespie | May 5, 2012

THE bizarre case of Gareth Williams has thrown the spotlight on an intelligence service whose shadowy work leads some critics to ask whether it has become a law to itself.

There is an address in South London where even the police can’t go. Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire, the officer leading the investigation into the baffling death of MI6 agent Gareth Williams – the so-called “Spy in the Bag” case – must have wished her powers extended to 85 Vauxhall Cross. But they don’t.

That address is the home of MI6 and although Sebire is a highly-experienced murder detective she doesn’t have security clearance to even enter the building much less question its inhabitants.

Instead her investigation depended on the mediation of Detective Superintendent Michael Broster of SO15, the counter-terrorism branch, which works closely with the intelligence services.

Only in the final stages of the inquest into Williams’s death this week did it emerge that no verbatim notes were taken of interviews with his MI6 colleagues and that a black holdall and nine memory sticks had been found at his desk but not handed over to the investigating officers.

Now 50 MI6 staff are facing DNA tests after the coroner Dr Fiona Wilcox, in a narrative verdict, ruled that it was likely Williams was “unlawfully killed”. Investigators are understood to believe that a colleague either from MI6 or the Government’s secret listening post at GCHQ was in the Pimlico flat when Williams died.

For his family – sister Ceri and parents Ian and Ellen – the inquest has raised as many questions as it has answered. And the most disturbing question of all is: does MI6 think it’s above the law?

The family has accused the intelligence service of withholding vital clues and failing to make “basic inquiries” until a week after Williams disappeared. “We are also extremely disappointed over the reluctance and failure of MI6 to make available relevant information,” they added.

Dr Wilcox echoed those concerns when she said that the forgetfulness of some employees at MI6, where Williams was on secondment from GCHQ, “stretched probability” and she refused to rule out the possibility that someone from the world of intelligence was involved.

From the moment the 31-year-old’s body was discovered in a North Face bag in the bath of his flat the response of MI6 has been puzzling. It took staff seven days even to report Williams – a conscientious time-keeper – missing then they appeared keen for police to be first into the apartment that MI6 has used for many years as temporary accommodation for employees.

The flat’s heating had been turned up high, despite the warmth of August, speeding up the decomposition of the body. The placing of the bag containing Williams into the bath prevented the giveaway leakage of fluids through the floor.

There were suggestions that the flat had been “swept” by someone who was forensically aware, to remove as many clues as possible.

Dr Wilcox said there was no evidence to suggest MI6 was involved in the death but “it is still a legitimate line of inquiry” and she added that “many agencies fell short” in the aftermath.

Sir John Sawers, MI6 chief, has apologised “unreservedly”, saying that lessons had been learned. But have they?

The problem may be that deep within MI6, in its culture and attitudes, lies a belief that the law is for other people.

The very nature of its work (MI6 deals with foreign intelligence, MI5 with domestic) means it is often on the boundaries of legality. The service is already under investigation for its part in sending Libyan dissidents into the hands of Muammar Gaddafi’s secret police.

Conservative MP Andrew Tyne, chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on extraordinary rendition, this week called on Foreign Secretary William Hague to investigate whether MI6 officers had briefed journalists over the Libyan case – in breach of the Official Secrets Act.

The 1994 Intelligence Services Act allows MI6 officers to carry out acts abroad that if done in Britain would be in breach of criminal law. It would be hardly surprising if that attitude spreads to their staff at home.

Michael Smith, author of SIX: The Real James Bonds, says: “MI6 would recoil at any suggestion that it sees itself as above the law but the inherent secrecy of organisations like MI6 does tend to make them think that keeping everything they do secret, even the slightest thing, is so important that it transcends everything else.

“We’ve definitely seen that here, which is why the coroner and some police officers are so angry, justifiably so.”

But who are the people who spend their days working in the modernistic building on the banks of the Thames at 85 Vauxhall Cross?

There are about 2,500 people working for MI6 of whom about half are support staff.

The others are divided into two types: Intelligence Branch (IB) officers and General Service officers.

General Service officers asses reports.

It is the IB officers who are the real James Bonds. They train in the "killing houses" of the SAS and SBS at Hereford and Poole and have their own firing range at the MI6 training school at Fort Monckton on the Solent.

Within their shadowy world there are as many tensions and disagreements as in any workplace but these are hidden. In the Williams case a senior MI6 officer identified as F blamed his subordinate G for a "breakdown in communications" but G was not disciplined and no one will ever know who they are.

But Williams was a computer expert on secondment from GCHQ in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. What sort of people work there?

“Geeks,” said one who knows GCHQ staff but did not want to be identified. “They are brilliant in languages, maths or computers but they tend to be the sort of people who don’t mix easily. At university they are always the top ones in their class but they’re loners. A bit awkward.”

That description certainly fits Williams. He was a fitness fanatic who loved competitive cycling but also had a £20,000 collection of women’s clothing in his flat. When it came to the inquest, friends were few and far between.

HOWEVER those who did know him believe the picture painted during the inquiry was misleading. Some have claimed the clothes were gifts for female friends and talk of him visiting claustrophilia websites turned out to be based on four visits in two years. Hardly evidence of a dangerous obsession, as Dr Wilcox pointed out.

Perhaps the truth about what happened to Williams has fallen victim to MI6’s rather ambivalent attitude to the law.

“The secret world lives in a bubble,” says Smith. “It very often seeks to keep secret even things that are freely available on the internet.”

Another intelligence services expert, author Michael Burleigh, says: “After imagining that it could outmanoeuvre Plod, meaning highly-competent detectives, MI6 needs to think about how it lost track of its ‘vital’ employee – for tracking people is what it allegedly does on a global stage.

“It needs also to think about how it can allay the understandable distress of the Williams family while helping DCI Sebire, who has every right to feel short-changed.”

By protecting its right to secrecy every step of the way in the case of Gareth Williams, MI6 may actually be doing nothing more than what it does best: keeping secrets. What it does not appear to have done is to have helped significantly in finding out the truth of what happened in that Pimlico flat.

And MI6 seems to have shown scant regard for the others involved, not least Williams’s sister and his parents.

Because MI6 appears to think of itself as being above the law it hasn’t convinced anyone that it did the right thing.

It has just made itself look guilty.

Daily Record : Intelligence expert Crispin Black on why sex games feature in so many spy deaths

Intelligence expert Crispin Black on why sex games feature in so many spy deaths

By Crispin Black | former government intelligence adviser | May 5, 2012

SITTING at the Gareth Williams inquest this week, listening to the more lurid details of the case, it occurred to me the death of spooks in bizarre circumstances involving sex games or women’s clothing is hardly an unusual event.

Disposing of an enemy and making it look like a perverted fantasy gone wrong is in the training manuals of every spy agency from MI6 to Mossad.

Codebreaker Gareth, from Anglesey, north Wales, was found dead in a locked bag, in a flat full of women’s clothing and wigs and with his internet browsing history conveniently featuring bondage sites, sparking a flurry of allegations which horrified his parents.

But the fact the 31-year-old’s death scene was organised in such a way as to suggest a sex game gone wrong should make us more suspicious, not less.

The sex game cover is a very useful mechanism in a murder. Not only does it provide a disguise for the actual means and method of death, it trashes the reputation of the victim and blunts the energy of any subsequent investigation.

And it appears to explain the astonishing number of spies, and other people who step into their murky world, who turn up dead in circumstances similar to Gareth.

Take GCHQ personnel for instance, those that work at the vast electronic doughnut in Cheltenham that is responsible for intercepting and decoding secret electronic traffic of interest to Her Majesty’s Government. And Gareth’s ultimate employer.

In 1983, 25-year-old Stephen Drinkwater, who worked as a clerk at GCHQ, was found dead at his home with a plastic bag over his head. In 1997 another worker, Nicholas Husband, 46, was found dead at home dressed in a bra and panties – with a plastic bag over his head.

Two years later, Kevin Allen, 31, a language expert at GCHQ, was found dead in his bed with a plastic bag over his head and a dust mask over his mouth. One wonders what the Gloucestershire Constabulary make of it all.

To be fair, the kind of higher mathematical ability that many GCHQ codebreakers have is rare and it sometimes comes with some personal eccentricities attached.

Alan Turing, the Cambridge academic and founder of modern computer science who became the greatest of the wartime Bletchley Park codebreakers was a distinctly odd fish – a loner with sexual hang-ups who seemed to spend most of his waking hours dreaming of obscure mathematical theorems.

The point was amusingly made in 60s film The Italian Job in which Charlie Croker, played by Michael Caine, recruits computer genius Professor Simon Peach – Benny Hill – to pull off a daring bullion robbery.

But the whole scheme nearly comes unstuck as Prof Peach is unable to control his powerful urges towards large women. MI6, who recruit a more worldly-wise type than the boffins of GCHQ, have not been immune.

In 1994 ex-MI6 man turned journalist James Rusbridger, 65, was found hanged at his house in Cornwall – in a green chemical protection suit including rubber gloves, gas mask and black plastic mackintosh. Bondage pictures completed the tableau.

And of course, according to the pathologist, it turned out he probably did it himself as part of a sex game.

The same year Stephen Milligan, the Tory MP for Eastleigh, was found dead with electrical flex tied round his neck, a black bin liner over his head and wearing stockings and suspenders.

The 45-year-old was also tied to a chair and had a satsuma stuffed into his mouth.

His boss at the time, then junior defence minister Jonathan Aitken, has since denied suggestions Milligan had links to MI6.

Even if you are not a spook you need to be careful. In 1990, ex-RAF helicopter pilot and editor of Defence Helicopter World Jonathan Moyle, 28, was found hanged in the wardrobe of his hotel in Chile with a pillow case over his head.

At the time his demise was widely thought to be an auto-erotic accident. He was in fact almost certainly murdered after uncovering links between Chilean arms dealers and Saddam Hussein.

The last person to give evidence at the Gareth Williams inquest was Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire – the senior investigating officer in the case.

She stated confidently that she was sure she and her team would be able to unlock the mystery in the end. But she also felt that this, her final appearance in court, was an appropriate time to remind the assembled audience of Williams’s internet browsing habits.

The last website he accessed probably just a few hours before his death was connected to cycling – a photo of him competing in a cross-country cycling race has been seen frequently in the national newspapers.

But then she went on to deal with the browsing information that had been made much of in the media over the last 20 months. Williams had accessed bondage websites on four days over a two-year period.

He had never accessed so-called “claustrophilia” sites which cater for people who get a thrill out of being confined in small spaces.

There we have it – the view of the woman in charge of the probe. Williams may have had a passing interest in bondage but no more than that. Even this passing interest may have a perfectly innocent explanation.

All MI6 officers get extensive training before they are allowed out on to the streets. Much of this takes place at Fort Monckton near Gosport in Hampshire – a Napoleonic era fortress surrounded by barbed wire and accessible only by a drawbridge.

It includes instruction in basic entry and exit procedures – buildings and cars mainly. If you ever get locked out of your flat and know a friendly spook from school or university give them a ring.

They should be able to get you back inside and could save you a fortune on locksmith’s fees. The instruction also includes some counter-surveillance techniques – how to make sure you are not followed.

And instruction on what to do if you fall into the wrong hands – resistance to interrogation and crucially, what to do if you are restrained – tied or chained up.

It is possible Williams had some of this training and it might well account for the episode when he was discovered tied up in his room by his landlady.

That the sex game angle was a simple smear is a view certainly not ruled out by the Westminster coroner who said, “it is still a legitimate line of inquiry” Gareth died at the hands of MI6.

In her narrative verdict, Dr Fiona Wilcox said: “I am sure a third party placed the bag into the bath and on the balance of probabilities locked the bag.

The cause of death was unnatural and likely to have been criminally mediated. I am therefore satisfied that on the balance of probabilities Gareth was killed unlawfully.”

I was impressed by Dr Wilcox. She had good judgment and wisdom as can be seen from her verdict in the case. She played down the bondage question and the interest in female fashion – Williams had an expensive collection of women’s clothing nearly all of it unworn and most of it not in his size.

She seemed to accept the view of Williams’s sister that these were a store of presents for his female acquaintances. Dr Wilcox pretty much dismissed the idea of any sexual component in his death.

Sadly that is the aspect many people will remember. Well, these kinky games with yourself or other people go wrong – what can you expect – becomes the prevailing attitude.

Occasionally the dark arts of postmortem reputation trashing are employed in a good cause and based on hard facts rather than a set-up.

The strange and squalid habits of Osama bin Laden before his death have been used to great effect by the US to make him a laughing stock.

Crispin Black’s espionage thriller The Falklands Intercept is published by Gibson Square on June 19.