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MI6 spy Gareth Williams hacked into restricted information about former US President Bill Clinton, it has been claimed.

The 31-year-old codebreaker was discovered inside a padlocked bag in a bathtub at his London home in 2010, sparking a real-life mystery worthy of any 007 thriller.

Theories about the maths genius with a taste for cross-dressing included that he was killed by foreign spooks, eliminated by fellow agents and suffocated when a sex game went disastrously wrong.

Now it is claimed he illegally obtained a guest list for an event attended by Mr Clinton as a favour for a friend who was going.

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A source told the Sun on Sunday: "The Clinton diary hack came at a time when Williams’s work with America was of the most sensitive nature.

"It was a diplomatic nightmare for Sir John Sawers, the new director of MI6 at the time."

In 2013 after a three-year investigation – and despite a coroner’s ruling that Mr Williams was killed unlawfully – the Metropolitan Police decided he had locked himself inside the red holdall and no one else was involved.

(Image: Getty)

But last week it was shockingly claimed unknown secret service agents could have killed the Welsh cryptographer after all – breaking in to his London flat through a skylight to clean evidence from the crime scene right under the noses of police.

A source close to the investigation revealed forensic officers noticed equipment left in the Pimlico flat had been moved, despite it being under armed guard.

Peter Faulding is the expert witness who tried – and failed – more than 300 times to fold himself into an identical bag and lock it from the outside.

Peter, who at 5ft 6in is a similar height and build, told the inquest into Mr Williams’ death it was “an unbelievable scenario” he could have got into alone, and even escapologist Harry Houdini would have struggled.

And the latest claims have fuelled his conviction the spy was murdered in “the perfect crime”.

Peter, 52, says: “If Gareth Williams had got into that bag as part of a weird sex game he would surely have had a knife with him in case things went wrong.

“It was summer time but the heating was turned up. His iPhone was completely wiped, the bathroom door was closed, the shower screen was closed, the lights were off and the keys to the padlock were under his body.

“There was unidentified DNA found – but none of Gareth’s own DNA on the padlock, the zipper, or the bath screen, and no palm prints on the bath from lowering himself in. Nothing.

“I think it is perfectly feasible that experts in covert entry got back in across the rooftops and removed forensic evidence. Unless the flat was monitored electronically no one would have known.”

Peter, a world leader in confined spaces rescues, a specialist in underground and underwater searches and an expert witness on suffocation, went on: “I got someone to zip me into the bag with oxygen monitors and worked out how long it would have taken for Gareth to suffocate – within 30 minutes.

“Then I tried to get into the bag and zip it closed. I managed that, but there was no way I could have put the padlock on the outside too. I told the coroner I believe he was dead before he was put in the bag – that he was murdered.”

The Metropolitan Police said Mr Williams' death had been "subject to a thorough investigation" and inquests, and they were "not prepared to speculate".