Disgraced MP Eric Joyce arrested again after new assault claim in Chalk Farm
Eric Joyce. Picture: PA Archive/Stefan Rousseau. - Credit: PA Archive/Press Association Images
Disgraced MP Eric Joyce was arrested for the fifth time in four years following a reported fight at a Chalk Farm convenience store during which he allegedly assaulted a teenage boy.
Police were called to News & Food Express in Chalk Farm Parade, Adelaide Road, at just after 9.40pm on October 17.
Officers arrived on the scene and found a man and two teenage boys involved in an altercation.
Mr Joyce, an independent MP for Falkirk who resigned from the Labour Party in the wake of an assault conviction in 2012, was subsequently arrested on suspicion of actual bodily harm, while a 14-year-old boy was arrested at the scene for possession of cannabis.
Both were taken to a central London police station for questioning and have since been bailed to a date in early December pending further enquiries. Neither required medical treatment.
In a statement published on his website, Mr Joyce said: “On the evening of Friday, October 17 I detained a youth in a shop in London.
“Damage had been done to the store. I asked the shopkeeper to call the police, and when officers arrived they arrested the youth and informed me that drugs had been recovered from the scene.
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“The officers also informed me that the youth had immediately made a complaint that I had assaulted him by detaining him.
“I was questioned by the police and told that because of my identity the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and the Metropolitan Police Press Office would be informed of the incident.
“I will make no further comment for now, other than to say a) that no alcohol was involved and b) I am not in the habit of summoning the police if I feel that I am in the wrong.”
In 2010, Mr Joyce, who is in a relationship with Primrose Hill-based journalist India Knight, was arrested for failing to provide a breath test to police after being stopped in his constituency and later handed a driving ban for the offence.
The former army major resigned from the Labour Party in 2012 after admitting assaulting fellow politicians in a House of Commons bar.
A year later he was arrested again following an alleged brawl in another Commons bar, which led to a ban on him buying alcohol in the Houses of Parliament.
In March this year, he was fined £1,500 after being arrested at Edinburgh Airport in May 2013 for abusing airport staff.
