The former Tory MP William Wragg has told of the “enormous guilt” he felt after realising he had been catfished into sending explicit photos on the gay dating app Grindr.
Police launched an investigation in April after at least 12 men with links to Westminster received unsolicited messages from an account posing as aliases “Charlie” and ‘“Abi”.
The fake accounts were allegedly engaged in a sophisticated scam designed to trick MPs and other figures in political circles into sending explicit pictures and other private or sensitive information.
Wragg, who was the MP for Hazel Grove, told the Times in April that he gave out the personal phone numbers of colleagues after he had sent intimate pictures of himself, saying he was “scared” and “mortified”.
But unlike others who had been scammed by the accounts, Wragg approached “Charlie” himself after spotting the profile on Grindr, believing it to be a real person.
Wragg claimed he felt threatened and under pressure to share the phone numbers and personal information of his Westminster colleagues with the mystery account, fearing that the catfish would leak his intimate images in retaliation if he did not comply.
In an interview with the BBC, Wragg said he spotted the first news articles about the Westminster honeytrap scandal on the train. He told the broadcaster: “My stomach just dropped. When I found out some of the things that had been going on, I just felt enormous guilt, enormous remorse.”
It was reported that 12 people working in Westminster had been contacted by an unknown number detailing prior meetings with politicians in efforts to acquire personal or sensitive information. The unsolicited messages would include details of the person’s career and campaigns they had worked on. A former government special adviser received the first message on 23 January 2023.
After Wragg, 36, handed over the personal information, the catfish told him to vouch for their identity with their next potential victims, with the catfish telling their fresh targets they were a former researcher for Wragg. Wragg agreed, which is what he feels “the most regret for” as it was “deceitful”. Soon after, Wragg began to have panic attacks, with bouts of yelling, crying and swearing. He recalled photographers and the press camped outside his parents’ house and said he experienced suicidal thoughts.
After receiving medical attention, Wragg returned to Westminster to resign the Conservative whip and from his posts on two parliamentary committees, having already announced he would not stand in the next general election.
He told the BBC: “I have no bitterness or anger left in me because I felt so wretched and awful in myself,” adding: “It’s a source of great shame that my time in parliament ended in this way.”
A member of the Labour party aged in his mid-20s was arrested in June in Islington, north London, on suspicion of harassment and offences under the Online Safety Act. He has been released on bail.
• In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
