A Conservative MP has come under fire after claiming the conviction of a fellow MP was a "dreadful miscarriage of justice”.
Wakefield MP Imran Ahmad Khan was found guilty of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy in 2008 on Monday.
In a post on his website and social media, which have both now been removed, former justice minister Crispin Blunt claimed Khan was the victim of a “dreadful miscarriage of justice”.
Mr Khan, 48, was expelled from the Conservative party "with immediate effect" following the verdict at Southwark Crown Court.
Shortly before Mr Blunt deleted the statement, the senior Tory source said his views were “wholly unacceptable” and “we expect the statement to be retracted first thing this morning”.
Labour condemned Mr Blunt’s defence of Khan and members of a cross-party LGBT group that the Reigate MP chairs have quit in protest, with one urging him to resign from his role.
Anneliese Dodds, Labour Party chairwoman and shadow equalities secretary, called Mr Blunt’s comments “disgraceful”.
This is disgraceful.@BorisJohnson and @OliverDowden must take action against this Tory MP and distance their party from his comments. https://t.co/qstFoVHBR4
— Anneliese Dodds 💙 (@AnnelieseDodds) April 11, 2022
She called on Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Tory chairman Oliver Dowden to “take action” against the former prisons minister.
Members of the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on Global LGBT+ Rights, including Labour MP Chris Bryant and the SNP’s Stewart McDonald and Joanna Cherry, said they were quitting the cross-party body which Mr Blunt chairs.
Mr Bryant described the remarks as “completely inappropriate”.
Urging Mr Blunt to quit as APPG chairman, Mr McDonald tweeted: “Parliament needs a respected and robust LGBT group and Crispin can no longer provide that leadership. He should stand down.”
Ms Cherry tweeted that Mr Blunt’s statement was the “last straw” for her membership of the group and that she intended to resign on Tuesday.
Urging Mr Blunt to quit as APPG chairman, Mr McDonald tweeted: “Parliament needs a respected and robust LGBT group and Crispin can no longer provide that leadership. He should stand down.”
Ms Cherry tweeted that Mr Blunt’s statement was the “last straw” for her membership of the group and that she intended to resign on Tuesday.
In a now-deleted statement published on his website, Mr Blunt, who came out as gay in 2010, said the jury’s decision in Khan’s case was “nothing short of an international scandal”.
The court heard how Khan, a gay Muslim elected to Parliament in 2019, forced the then-teenager to drink gin and tonic, dragged him upstairs, pushed him on to a bed and asked him to watch pornography before the attack at a house in Staffordshire in January 2008.
But Mr Blunt, who was at the London court on Monday, said the case “relied on lazy tropes about LGBT+ people” and argued the result had “dreadful wider implications” for LGBT Muslims “around the world”.
The Tory MP said: “I am utterly appalled and distraught at the dreadful miscarriage of justice that has befallen my friend and colleague Imran Ahmad Khan, MP for Wakefield since December 2019.
“His conviction today is nothing short of an international scandal, with dreadful wider implications for millions of LGBT+ Muslims around the world.
“I sat through some of the trial. The conduct of this case relied on lazy tropes about LGBT+ people that we might have thought we had put behind us decades ago.
“As a former justice minister, I was prepared to testify about the truly extraordinary sequence of events that has resulted in Imran being put through this nightmare start to his parliamentary career.”
Khan’s legal team said he plans to appeal against the conviction.
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