MOSCOW, January 5 (Sputnik) — A 46-year-old Sussex man became the first to speak out publically against Sir Peter Morrison, a member of Margaret Thatcher's government accused of pedophilia and child rape in the 1980s.
The alleged victim, speaking to The Telegraph on condition of anonymity, noted that Morrison had arrived at his home in the village of Harting on the Sussex border in 1982. The MP was said to have asked the boy for his phone number, and invited him to his home on several occasions. The boy and his father, with whom Morrison had also spoken, told the newspaper that they were impressed by Morrison's apparent wealth and well-spoken manner. The MP was said to have revealed only his first name, and that he was a barrister.
After naively agreeing to visit with 'Peter the Barrister', the accuser said that Morrison had arrived to pick him up in a chauffeured car. He noted that as soon as he was in the car, the assault began. "He'd leave me alone for a little bit, and then he'd come at me again," the man said. Attempting an escape while the car was stopped for gas, the man noted that the car appeared to have been equipped with "some sort of child lock and I couldn't get out."
With Morrison telling him that he would be staying with him that night, the boy managed to escape and to go back home, where he told his father what had happened. Contacting the police that evening, the boy was taken to hospital the next day. The father recalled that medics told him that his son had "certainly been sexually assaulted." Soon afterwards detectives from Scotland Yard arrived to take a detailed statement from the boy, after which all contact had stopped.
Nearly a year later, the officers returned with the boy's clothes in a bag, and told his family that the accused had been caught and convicted in a Chelsea court and sentenced to two years in prison. The police said that the boy wouldn't need to testify because he was underage. The father said that the officers told him that there was no "nothing more to worry about," and that "I thought that was the end of that and we could start to forget about the whole thing."
The man told The Telegraph that it was only years later that came to recognize Morrison, a member of Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government, as his rapist, and that he was afraid that he would not be believed. He noted that the experienced "ruined" his life, led him to leave school, and resulted in him losing all confidence in himself. "I couldn't handle what had happened to me," he noted. Counseling is said to have helped him get over the ordeal, but the man notes that "I've never made the most of my life," and for that he blames Morrison. "I hate him," he told the newspaper.
Part of a Wider, High Profile Scandal
The victim told The Telegraph that he believed his attacker "got away with it" because he "was a high-profile guy." He noted that "either the police were paid off or they hushed it up because he was an MP."
