Father of murdered boy claims abuse link

Claim son may have been killed by Westminster paedophile ring

The father of an eight-year-old boy murdered 33 years ago has reportedly claimed his son may have been killed by a Westminster paedophile ring.

Vishambar Mehrotra, a retired magistrate, recorded a male prostitute saying in a telephone call that his son Vishal may have been abducted and taken to the Elm Guest House in Barnes, south-west London, in 1981, The Daily Telegraph said.

Mr Mehrotra took the recording to the Metropolitan Police at the time but told the newspaper they refused to investigate an allegation implicating “judges and politicians”.

Scotland Yard announced last week it was investigating possible murders linked to the Elm Guest House.

The new inquiry was triggered when an alleged victim came forward claiming to have witnessed three boys being killed, including one allegedly strangled by a Tory MP during a sex game.

The skull and several rib bones of eight-year-old Vishal were discovered in 1982 by pigeon shooters in remote marshland at Durford Abbey Farm, at Rogate, close to the Hampshire-West Sussex border.

Vishal, from Putney, south-west London, vanished while shopping with his nanny and sister on July 29 1981 —— the same day Lady Diana and Prince Charles were married.

Mr Mehrotra, now 69 and living in West Molesey, in south-west London, claims he received an anonymous call from a male prostitute in the months following, The Daily Telegraph reported.

A man he guessed to be in his 20s told him Vishal may have been abducted by “highly placed” paedophiles operating from the Elm Guest House.

He told the newspaper:

“He said there were very highly placed people there. He talked about judges and politicians who were abusing little boys.”

Mr Mehrotra, a solicitor who was a JP at Wimbledon magistrates’ court until retiring in 2006, claims the man said he had already informed police about activities at the guesthouse, but had received no response.

He added: “I recorded the whole 15-minute conversation and took it to police. But instead of investigating it, they just pooh-poohed it and I never heard anything about the tape again. The whole thing went cold.”

At the inquest into Vishal’s death, the West Sussex coroner Mark Calvert Lee recorded an open verdict but said “foul play” was likely.

Mr Mehrotra, now 69 and living in West Molesey near Hampton Court, said he had “hardly been contacted” by police in the intervening years.

He said he had not been spoken to in recent months despite the alleged witness reporting the murder of three boys at the time Vishal vanished.

Mr Mehrotra said: “This guesthouse was right next to where Vishal disappeared. There were predatory people there who were taking young boys and abusing them.”