MASONIC CONNECTION.
In February 2017 the Express reported;
ONE OF Britain’s most influential paedophiles was the head of a Masonic lodge founded and frequented by GCHQ spies.
Alan Wright, 75, was once a Grand Master in the secretive organization and would have been present at meetings attended by Prince Michael of Kent.
He resigned when the details of his activities came to light.
Now he could face jail when he appears at Ipswich Crown Court for sentence next month. The maximum term for incitement is 10 years. Suffolk Police set up the sting after gathering intelligence on Wright’s private life, with specialist officers pretending to be a child online.
Wright thought he was communicating with a 14-year-old boy and sent him pictures of his private parts over the Internet. Through gay dating app Grindr he arranged to meet the “boy” at Bury St Edmunds railway station, Suffolk, last November.
However, when Wright arrived he was met by officers who took him to a local police station for questioning. A former Grand Master of the Grand Council of Royal and Select Masters, he was also Grand Master of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Mark Master Masons of Essex.
Wright regularly attended meetings at a Freemasons hall in St James Street, London, and has been described as a “significant” figure in the organisation. Sources say that he would have attended some meetings with Prince Michael, who is a popular Freemason, but the men were not friends.
A spokesman for the United Grand Lodge of England said: “We were made aware of an allegation against a Freemason on December 1, 2016, who immediately resigned from the organisation.
“Having learned of the situation we have no further information currently, and fully believe that this is a one-off, isolated incident.
Isolated Incident?
In May 2015 the Express reported this story!
Keith Harding, former membership secretary of the Paedophile Information Exchange (Pie) was made Worshipful Master of the Mercurius Lodge in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, in 2011.
The child molester, who died last summer, presided over ceremonies and rituals from an ornate throne.
Harding was convicted of an indecent assault against four children aged eight and nine in 1958 and classified a Schedule-1 offender, which meant the offence remained on his criminal record all his life.
His name was also on a list of about 400 Pie members seized by police in 1984, the year the organisation disbanded.
The Sunday Express revealed earlier this month how Harding met MPs Cyril Smith and Leon Brittan in the 1980s when he ran a north London antiques store.
Thirty-five years ago he appeared alongside paedophile television presenter Jimmy Savile in a Christmas special of Jim’ll Fix It.
The lodge boasts of its Government Communications Headquarters heritage on its website.
A source close to Harding revealed: “The Mercurius Lodge is known as the Spies Lodge because it was set up by GCHQ and over the years many intelligence officers have become members.
“These are people trained to find out sensitive information and yet none of them had any idea of Keith’s background and past convictions.
“They even voted him the highest honour by making him Worshipful Master.
“Keith felt the Freemasons were somewhere he finally belonged, he called them his “brotherhood”.
“When he died last year, they arranged his funeral and made sure the ceremony started at midday because the time apparently has significance within Masonic ritual.”
Spies displaced from London and Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire, where the German wartime Enigma code was cracked, set up the Mercurius Lodge in 1957.
It meets at the Grade IIlisted Cheltenham Masonic Hall, purpose-built in 1823.
Harding ran the Mechanical Music Museum 10 miles away in Northleach after moving from London in 1987.
In 2013, he organised a trip to the museum for Freemasons and their families.
A photograph shows Harding wearing a Masonic apron, collar and medals during a ceremony a couple of years ago.
The Mercurius Lodge last night declined to comment.
Detectives probing historical sexual abuse allegations revealed on Wednesday they are investigating 1,433 suspects, including 135 from the entertainment industry, 76 politicians, seven sportsmen and 43 from the music industry.
Another Isolated Incident?
In November 2012 the Daily Star reported.
Keith Gregory suffered two years of mental, physical and sexual abuse at the Bryn Estyn children’s home.
Mr Gregory, now a councillor in Wrexham, said he was regularly driven out of the home by staff to a hotel where he was sexually assaulted. He claimed up to 13 other victims had committed suicide.
Mr Gregory told BBC Radio 5 Live he is convinced the abusers escaped justice through Masonic loyalty.
He said: “Most of them were Freemasons. There were two MPs, senior judges, serving police officers, senior police officers, market traders, business people from Wrexham – but there were people from all over Britain.
“One MP was a Conservative but I’m not sure of the other.”
He added: “Everyone at Bryn Estyn used to cry themselves to sleep every night.”
Prime Minister David Cameron has ordered an investigation.
Lots of men wearing Masonic garbs at Jimmy Savile's Funeral!
