LONDON (Reuters) - A 20-year-old man has been arrested over the theft of papers relating to the release of Maxine Carr, the former girlfriend of one of Britain’s most notorious murderers, police say.
The man was arrested on Friday in north London near where Home Office documents were stolen from a civil servant’s car on the eve of Carr’s release.
Carr, 27, served half of her three-year sentence for obstructing police investigating the 2002 Soham schoolgirls’ murders, for which her former fiance was convicted.
Newspapers said the documents outlined details of her secret new identity and the location of her new home.
The arrangements had been closely guarded for fear of revenge attacks from vigilantes over her role in the Soham case.
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Carr was sentenced last year for lying to police investigating the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in Soham, Cambridgeshire. She had been in prison on remand since her arrest in August 2002.
She gave a false alibi for her former fiance Ian Huntley, 30, who got two life terms for murdering the 10-year-olds in one of Britain’s most high-profile criminal cases in recent times.
Newspapers on Friday lost a bid to pursue and unmask Carr’s secret new identity.
A High Court judge upheld an injunction that barred media from disclosing Carr’s new identity after her lawyer revealed she has received several death threats.
