UNITED KINGDOM
Daily Mail
By TOM KELLY and REBECCA ENGLISH FOR THE DAILY MAIL
Prince Charles was last night sensationally linked to Establishment support for a predatory bishop that led to a cover-up of his crimes.
The heir to the throne was forced to deny interfering in the legal process to help Peter Ball escape sex abuse charges as the 83-year-old was finally brought to justice yesterday over offences against boys dating back 40 years.
Charles’s dramatic intervention came after the Old Bailey was told a royal had written in support of the former Bishop of Lewes and Gloucester when he was first investigated.
The prince is understood to have been among MPs, cabinet ministers, public school headmasters and a former lord chief justice all said to have assisted Ball.
The astonishing claims emerged on the day Scotland Yard’s VIP abuse inquiry team faced fresh turmoil after being forced to apologise to Lord Brittan’s widow over its bungled probe into false rape allegations against him.
On Tuesday, the BBC’s Panorama cast grave doubt on the reliability of the inquiry’s key witnesses.
Ball was jailed for 32 months at the Old Bailey yesterday.
But in 1993 he was let off with a caution after admitting gross indecency against a boy of 17.
The royal who wrote to support him was not named in court, but Ball counted Charles as a ‘loyal friend’ and publicly thanked him for providing him with a Duchy of Cornwall home following his criminal caution.
Ball also read the homily at the funeral of the father of Camilla Parker Bowles in 2006.
A spokesman for Charles insisted: ‘The Prince of Wales made no intervention in the judicial process on behalf of Peter Ball.’
However he failed to deny there had been a letter in support of Ball.
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