Metropolitan Police

The Metropolitan Police (Met), also known as Scotland Yard, was the police force for London and the primary investigative body in multiple child abuse and trafficking cases documented across the network. The Metropolitan Police raided the Elm Guest House in June 1982 after the suburban terrace townhouse was suspected of operating an illegal brothel. After the premises were raided, 23 men were detained among bedroom suites containing whips, chains, and ropes, and communal areas including a lounge bar, spa, sauna facility, and screening room for pornography. According to police sources, three of the guests were parliamentary ministers and a fourth was a member of the Queen's royal staff. Scotland Yard was expected to reopen files on the murder of one boy and the disappearance of another in connection with the investigation, but a Scotland Yard official described it as a routine investigation into a brothel. A source close to the investigation stated that top brass had ordered everything to be played down and that every attempt was being made to ensure the names of VIPs did not leak out.¹

Scotland Yard's obscene materials division opened investigations into Sidney Cooke and his gang, Warwick Spinks, and the Amsterdam boy brothel network during the 1980s and 1990s. In October 1990, the obscene materials division received information from multiple informants on a group of British pedophiles trafficking boys across the English Channel into Amsterdam for the production of hardcore child pornography. A Scotland Yard detective named Michael Hames headed the investigation into Warwick Spinks. Scotland Yard also received information from Interpol in Luxembourg regarding Karl Hobi and the Swiss snuff film network. What began as a Scotland Yard inquiry into the possibility that the murder of Jason Swift had been filmed by Cooke's gang later became a joint investigation with Dutch authorities targeting British foreign nationals in Amsterdam.¹

Missing Files

Multiple Scotland Yard investigation files went missing over the years. The Operation Orchid files pertaining to Cooke's gang and the Elm Guest House could not be located when detectives checked in 2014. The dossier Geoffrey Dickens handed to Leon Brittan in 1983 had been either lost or destroyed by the Home Office. Because Leon Brittan was the minister overseeing domestic intelligence agencies at the time, past investigations into the alleged VIP pedophile ring were suspected of having been covered up by MI5.¹