Entertainer Michael Barrymore is entitled to more than nominal damages from Essex police over a wrongful arrest that he says destroyed his career, a high court judge has ruled.

Mr Justice Stuart-Smith, sitting in London on Friday, ruled against the force, which had argued that the star should only receive a nominal payout. Barrymore, 65, who was not present for the decision, values his claim at more than £2.4m.

The judge did not decide on the sum to be awarded, as his ruling dealt only with the preliminary issue of the level of damages to be awarded to Barrymore, who brought the action in his real name, Michael Ciaran Parker.

Essex police had admitted the arrest was unlawful, as the arresting officer did not have reasonable grounds to suspect that Barrymore was guilty.

Stuart-Smith ruled that the defendant – the chief constable of Essex police – “has failed to prove that, if not arrested unlawfully as he was, Mr Parker could and would have been arrested lawfully”.

He added: “Mr Parker is entitled to recover more than nominal damages.”

But the decision rested on a legal technicality, with the judge accepting there was information available to police that could have given police reasonable grounds for an arrest. However, the designated arresting officer, who had been briefed with that information, was not present at the time Barrymore was taken into custody.



Barrymore was arrested and detained in June 2007 on suspicion of the rape and murder of Stuart Lubbock, 31, who was found in the swimming pool at the star’s Roydon home six years earlier.

He was released without charge the following September after the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was insufficient evidence to justify charging him or anyone else with any offences relating to Lubbock’s death.

Stuart Lubbock. Photograph: Essex police/PA

Lubbock died in hospital after a party at Barrymore’s home on 31 March 2001. A postmortem showed he had suffered severe anal injuries that could have been the result of a sexual attack. Ecstasy and cocaine were also found in his system and he was nearly three times the drink-drive limit when he died, tests found.

Two of the guests at the party were arrested on suspicion of murder and later released without charge. Barrymore was not treated as a suspect at the time, although he accepted a caution for possession of cannabis.

It was after a review of the investigation that police decided to arrest Barrymore and two other suspects in June 2007.

Essex police said: “The judgment is clear that the officers leading the investigation into Stuart Lubbock’s death had reasonable grounds to suspect Mr Parker had raped or murdered Mr Lubbock at his home address and had reasonable grounds for believing that it was necessary to arrest him.

“It is acknowledged that the threshold for forming this suspicion is low and falls far short of that required to charge or convict a person.

“The judgment also states there was clear evidence of a violent penetrating assault which may have been rape and that Mr Parker was one of a small and closed group of people who could have committed the assault.

“Unfortunately the designated arresting officer who did have the required knowledge to make a lawful arrest was stuck in traffic when Mr Parker was seen on 14 June 2007.



“For operational reasons it was not desirable to postpone the arrest which was co-ordinated with the arrest of two other suspects.



“It is agreed that the surveillance officer who arrested Mr Parker did not have the required grounds for suspicion in his mind and therefore the arrest was unlawful.”

The statement added: “Today’s judgment must not overshadow the questions which are still unanswered for Mr Lubbock’s family and friends. Sixteen years on they still need to know what happened to Stuart on that night, how he was injured, and who is responsible for his death.

“A small number of people know the answers to those questions and over the years loyalties change and somebody may want to help us at this time.”