Watchdog to investigate Met over allegations in letter about Meghan’s father

The BBC says Roslyn Loveless, the former wife of Thomas Markle, wrote a letter containing allegations about him that the Metropolitan Police received in January 2019. The reported identification comes as the force reviews its handling of the letter: it passed the allegations to the office of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, but not to other law-enforcement agencies.

The Telegraph says it has seen a copy of the letter and also identifies Loveless as its sender. Loveless, who died in 2024, was the mother of Meghan’s half-siblings, Samantha Markle and Thomas Markle Jr. Thomas Markle said he did not believe his former wife had written the letter and called the claim a “set-up”. He denies the allegations against him.

The Met says the letter contained claims about alleged offending outside the UK and was sent to its Protection Command because of concerns about Meghan’s security. It is considering whether to refer its handling of the matter to the Independent Office for Police Conduct. Meghan said the letter made “troubling and disturbing” allegations and that she had been assured they were being investigated. She initially dated it to 2018; her spokesperson later accepted that she may have been mistaken and said the Met’s 2019 record should be the reference point.

Separately, authorities in the Philippines say they are investigating allegations concerning Markle after his son claimed to have found child sexual abuse images belonging to him at a former home there. Markle denies possessing such images. The detailed contents of the 2019 letter have not been made public, so the later claim does not establish what the letter alleged or whether those allegations are true.

Update

The UK police watchdog is to investigate why the Metropolitan Police did not pass allegations about Thomas Markle to overseas authorities after receiving a letter in 2019. The inquiry concerns the force’s handling of the claims, not whether the Duchess of Sussex’s father committed an offence.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) announced its decision on Friday, a day after the Met referred itself to the watchdog. The Met said its protection command had received the letter in January 2019. It contained allegations of offending outside the UK, which officers assessed before sending the letter to the office of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. The force said it did not share the allegations with other law enforcement agencies.

The Met had previously said it was reviewing its handling of the letter. Its referral to the IOPC covered both the decision not to alert other agencies and the decision to send the letter to Harry and Meghan’s office. The watchdog’s independent investigation focuses on the failure to notify relevant overseas authorities. It has returned a separate question about a possible breach of information-sharing rules to the force rather than investigate it itself.

ITV News says it has seen the handwritten letter and identifies its author as Markle’s former wife, Roslyn Loveless. ITV says it made allegations of sexual offences involving children abroad. Markle denies the allegations and has said he does not believe his former wife wrote the letter.

In a separate inquiry in the Philippines, police are examining material handed in by Markle’s son, who alleges it includes child sexual abuse images. A prosecutor in Cebu told BusinessMirror that police had obtained a warrant to examine computer data, but said he had not inspected the material himself. It is not established whether that material has any connection to the 2019 letter. The Met said on Thursday that it was preparing referrals concerning the letter’s allegations to overseas law enforcement agencies and expected to complete them within days.