Trio on Olympic Park fraud charges (From Bicester Advertiser)

Trio on Olympic Park fraud charges

3:30pm Wednesday 14th November 2012 in National News © Press Association 2013

Three people have been charged with fraud over allegations of unlawful obtaining of information linked to the Olympic Park, Scotland Yard has said.

Detectives have been investigating claims made by West Ham United Football Club and the Olympic Park Legacy Company.

Richard Michael Forrest, 30, Lee Stewart, 39, and Howard Hill, 58, are all due to appear in court on November 28.

The investigation surrounds allegations that Tottenham Hotspur Football Club spied on Olympic officials during its stadium bid.

Forrest, from Crawley, West Sussex, and Stewart, from Esher in Surrey, are both accused of conspiracy with Hill to commit fraud by false representation. Hill, from Stockport in Cheshire, is accused of conspiracy with the other two men to commit the same offence.

They will all appear at Westminster Magistrates' Court later this month.

Olympic Park Legacy Company (OPLC) chairwoman Baroness Ford claimed in November last year that Spurs had all 14 members of her board monitored by private investigators. The north London club denied putting officials under surveillance.

There was a deal with West Ham and Newham Council to use the stadium in Stratford, east London, after the 2012 Games, but that collapsed in October last year.

Tottenham had already lost out to West Ham in the race to become the OPLC's first choice to move into the stadium after the Olympics.

Challenges by Tottenham Hotspur and Leyton Orient, plus an anonymous complaint to the European Commission, led to fears that court action could drag on for years while the stadium remained empty.