The law chief accused of pursuing a show trial against tragic Caroline Flack dramatically insisted yesterday: I was right to charge her.
Ed Beltrami asked what would have happened if the Love Island host attacked her boyfiend Lewis Burton again because the Crown Prosecution Service had dropped the case.
Mr Beltrami, who was North London area head of the CPS, admitted he had never heard of Caroline when the high-profile case landed on his desk.
But he said: “You’ve got to do what you think is right. You cannot do what you think is popular.”
Caroline, 40, took her life at her London home in February less than three weeks before her trial was due to start.
Mr Beltrami said the case had troubled him since the ITV2 star’s death but he insisted the right decision had been made.
He said the protection of domestic abuse victims relies on the CPS sticking the course.
He said: “When you make that decision to proceed with case you have absolutely no idea that the defendant is going to take her own life.”
Caroline was charged with assaulting model and ex-tennis pro Lewis, 28, with a bedside lamp at her £1million North London flat on December 12.
At her first court appearance on December 23 the prosecution said that when police arrived to investigate a 999 call both Caroline and Lewis were covered in blood and one officer likened the scene to a horror movie.
But Lewis refused to support the prosecution and wanted the charge dropped.
Mr Beltrami said the case was referred to him for a final decision, adding: “To be absolutely frank with you I had never actually heard of her.”
He says the decision to prosecute was the right one, despite criticism from celebrities including Piers Morgan.
Mr Beltrami said: “You don’t just fold at the first sign of trouble – the fact that the victim doesn’t want to know. You’ve got to look at whether you can prosecute without the support of the victim.
“Domestic abuse has a high risk of repetition, a high risk of the offending escalating, so you have to look at that.
“The facts of this case were the guy had made his complaint.
“He had phoned the police, he was terrified he was going to be killed, he’s been hit over the head with a weapon, namely a lamp, he’s got a cut to his head, and she’s made an admission to the police at the scene.
“So in the general principles of domestic abuse you say, ‘Well I’m going to proceed without the victim because I’ve got the admission, I’ve got the complaint from the victim which I’ll try to get in, I’ve got the physical evidence of the cut to the head and the mess in the flat which has been filmed by the police’.
“But obviously you can’t possibly anticipate that the defendant is going to take her own life. You can’t.”
After her death, Caroline’s management team said the CPS had pursued her even though they knew she was vulnerable.
They said: “The CPS should look at themselves today and how they pursued a show trial that was not only without merit but not in the public interest.”
But Mr Beltrami – now chief prosecutor for Wales – told the Wales on Sunday newspaper that not charging somebody accused of domestic abuse could have led to tragedy for the victim, with the CPS blamed for it.
He said: “Supposing we had not proceeded and she goes back to live with the boyfriend and she loses her temper again on another occasion, hits him a bit harder with a lamp or with something else, and he dies. How would that look then?”
Caroline’s death sparked a public wave of grief. Her words “Be kind” were used in a campaign urging people to treat each other better on social media.
Yesterday when informed of the lawyer’s remarks, her family declined to comment.
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