WESTMINSTER (Labour Buzz) - Remember Charlie Elphicke? He was the former Conservative MP initially suspended last year for sexual assault before being let back in to help Theresa May win a vote of no confidence. Well, he was convicted yesterday.
At a time when convictions for rape and sexual assault are hitting record lows, Elphicke must have felt he was in with a good chance. For a conviction to stick these days, a criminal has to be about as bang to rights as it could be and so it seems to have been the case here.
Elpchicke was convicted on one case of sexual assault in 2007 and two further counts of sexual assault in 2016 against a second woman. Releasing Elphicke on bail ahead of sentencing in September, judge Ms. Justice Whipple said: “There is a very real possibility he faces immediate custody.”
During the trial, the court heard that in 2007 while his wife was away after the birth of their first son he ‘lunged’ at a woman in her 30s at his London home. He forced her onto a sofa, groped her breasts while shouting ‘I’m a naughty Tory’.
“He tried to kiss me and I moved my head, he pushed me down by my shoulders,” said the woman. “He had his knee between my legs and he was groping my breast.”
Elphicke claimed he kissed her under a misapprehension when she became tactile.
In 2016 he was at it again, when he twice assaulted a parliamentary worker attempting first to kiss her and, when that didn’t work, groping her breast.
“He had his mouth open, continually trying to kiss me,” his victim told the court. “It was like a disgusting, slobbery mess.”
A couple of weeks later he assaulted her again running his hands up her thigh and towards her groin. Elphicke claimed he was ‘besotted’ with the younger women and said he desired a sexual relationship with her.
The episode shows the sense of entitlement and double standards that courses through some parts of Westminster. Elphicke’s denials at the time were angry, both at the accusations and his suspension.
Natalie Dawson, of the CPS, said Elphicke had “lied repeatedly” and “failed to take responsibility for his behaviour and the harm suffered by his victims.”
The Conservative party wasn’t much better. The women said the attacks had a profound impact on them and ‘feared for their careers if they reported him’. Once allegations did come to the fore, the party
The party did remove the whip, but their disgust at his actions only ran so far. He had the whip withdrawn in 2017 when the ‘very serious’ allegations first surfaced, only to have it restored so he could support Theresa May in a vote of no confidence.
Despite the allegations, he remained an MP and was pictured with Boris Johnson in July 2019 shortly before he was formally charged. It was only then that he was finally suspended with his wife taking over his seat.
In a short statement, she announced that she was ending their marriage. The episode had, she said, caused her profound sorrow. “It ends my 25-year marriage to the only man I have ever loved,” she added.
(Written by Tom Cropper, Edited by Klaudia Fior)