Shamed ex-Tory MP Charlie Elphicke freed from prison after serving half of sentence

The disgraced ex-Dover MP was found guilty of one count of sexual assault in 2007 and two further counts in 2016. He has been released having served half of his sentence

Former Tory MP Charlie Elphicke has been released from prison.

The shamed ex-Dover MP was jailed for two years in September 2020 after being found guilty for sexually assaulting two women.

Elphicke had served just half of his sentence upon his release.

It is understood he was serving the final part of his sentence at HMP Leyhill in Gloucestershire, from where child killer Colin Pitchfork was also released earlier this month.

During his trial, jurors heard how he had asked one of his victims about bondage and sex, then kissed her and groped her breast before chasing her around his home, chanting: “I’m a naughty Tory.”

One sexual assault incident involved a woman in her 30s, the other was a Parliamentary worker in her 20s, Southwark Crown Court was told.

The sentencing judge described him as a “sexual predator” who used his “success and respectability as a cover” and told a “pack of lies”.

Natalie Elphicke, the current Conservative MP for Dover, ended the couple’s 25-year marriage after his conviction.

In March, Elphicke lost a Court of Appeal challenge against his jail term after his lawyers argued the sentence was too long and should have been suspended.

In the wake of the case, the Commons Standards Committee found five Conservatives, including Ms Elphicke, had breached the code of conduct over an “egregious” attempt to influence his legal proceedings.

As a result Ms Elphicke, Sir Roger Gale and Theresa Villiers were suspended from the House of Commons for a day.

They, along with Bob Stewart and Adam Holloway, had written to senior members of the judiciary raising concerns that a more junior judge was considering publishing character references provided for Mr Elphicke.

Elphicke became a Government whip during David Cameron’s premiership in 2015, but returned to the back benches when Theresa May came to power the following year.

He had the party whip suspended in 2017 when allegations of sexual assault first emerged, but it was controversially reinstated a year later for a crucial confidence vote in then-prime minister Mrs May.

The whip was withdrawn again the following summer when the Crown Prosecution Service announced its decision to charge Elphicke.