Police arrest man over Morgan McSweeney phone theft
A man has been arrested on suspicion of trying to sell Morgan McSweeney’s phone after it was stolen.
Mr McSweeney, Sir Keir Starmer’s former private secretary, reported the government device was stolen on October 20 last year. The theft became national news amid concerns that important speeches regarding the appointment of Lord Peter Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to the US could be lost as a result.
The Metropolitan Police said they arrested a 28-year-old man on suspicion of dealing in stolen goods as part of an investigation into the theft of a mobile phone in Belgrave Road, Pimlico.
Scotland Yard handed the man over to police last Wednesday and he was later released on bail. Police added that he was not suspected of being involved in the original theft last year.
A spokesman said: “Officers investigating the theft of a mobile phone in Belgrave Road, Pimlico, on 20 October 2025 arrested a 28-year-old man on suspicion of dealing in stolen goods.
“The arrest took place at an address in Peckham on Wednesday, April 29. The man was detained by police and later released on bail.
“He is suspected of buying and selling the phone after it was stolen. He is not suspected of being involved in the actual theft.
“The phone could not be recovered.”
It is believed the messages on the phone may fall within the scope of a call by MPs for the release of all documents relating to Lord Mandelson’s transfer to Washington after his links with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein were revealed.
The former adviser said he “probably” used disappearing messages on WhatsApp in his conversations with Lord Mandelson.
Mr McSweeney, who resigned in February over his role in the scandal, told the Foreign Affairs Committee at the end of April about the circumstances surrounding the theft of the Government phone.
“Someone jumped on the sidewalk and took my phone away from me,” he said. “The first thing I did was try to get it back. I tried to chase it, which was probably a mistake. The next thing I did was call number 10 and I would do whatever they told me to do.”
Mr McSweeney said: “Then I called 999. If number 10 had told me you had to tell the police or you had to tell the call handler what your job was, I would have done that. But otherwise, of course, I didn’t do that. I never went around saying ‘I’m a very serious, senior person’ in any part of my job.”
When he first called the police he described his location as Belgrave Street; this address was in Stepney, east London, rather than Belgrave Road in Pimlico.
When asked by the committee why he gave the wrong address, he said: “I got quite excited too. So I chased the man who stole my phone as best I could.”
He added: “I also said I was in Westminster.
“And I said I was in Belgrave Street in Westminster, I think it’s here… I was in Lower Belgrave Street. So it was a few months ago and I missed ‘Down’. I didn’t see it.”
The former No 10 chief of staff said: “I was out of breath, completely exhausted, because when you’re 48 you’re not supposed to chase people down the street, and then I was trying to get back to the original location of the incident so I could notify the 999 operator.”
