Ex-Met officer: MoS story 'endangered' my family

The former head of the Metropolitan Police's counter-terrorism command has accused the Mail on Sunday of causing a "threat" to his family's safety.

Bob Quick's family were endangered after the Sunday newspaper ran a story about his wife's car hire business, the former deputy commissioner told the Leveson inquiry yesterday.

Quick, who headed up the leaks inquiry which arrested Conservative MP Damian Green in 2009, became the centre of a Mail on Sunday investigation which, he alleges, questioned his judgment and motivation.

The Mail investigation endangered his family, said Quick, by revealing that the business was connected to the head of counter-terrorism.

"It did introduce some real anxieties for my wife and I about our children," he told the inquiry into media standards, which is currently focusing on the relationship between the press and the police.

"We had to move them out of the house until we could have a security review and make some modifications. I was well aware of cases where extremists and other violent individuals have targeted members of the police or security forces."
 
According to Quick he later concluded that "leaks" from the Damian Green investigation "may well have been sourced from people who were the subject of an interview themselves".

Later Tim Godwin, the former acting commissioner of the Met, gave evidence about the closeness of senior police officers to the media.

Upon close questioning from Lord Leveson, Godwin said that senior police officers "shouldn't be hiding away from being held to account" and that "if asked a reasonable question we should be able to answer it".

"The key concern that I have is that at the end of it we don't want the police to become hidden away again. I think openness and transparency has many benefits and equally I think there is an issue of the perception that the corruption investigation is wholesale of what goes on in the police services."

"The vast majority of men and women in the public service do not get involved in that."

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