# Revisited: the spy cops scandal (part 2)

Here's a direct link to the full podcast episode: 

This episode first aired on 9 December 2020.

In 2018, **Frank Bennett**’s sister Honor received a hand-delivered letter from a public inquiry about their 18-year-old brother Michael Hartley, who had been reported missing at sea, believed dead, 50 years before. For a moment, they thought Michael had been found, but in fact, the letter revealed that their dead brother’s identity had been stolen by a police officer who had penetrated two leftwing organisations. Using this false identity, the police spy had deceived a woman into a sexual relationship and had been prosecuted during his deployment. Frank talks to **Anushka Asthana** about his childhood and the impact his brother’s death had on him and his family. Knowing that, years on, his brother’s name had been used by police has had a huge impact on his mental health, he says. Frank describes the police’s behaviour as “disgusting”.

The Guardian’s Paul Lewis and Rob Evans on investigating one of England’s most covert police units and learning that they were using the identities of dead children. Frank Bennett reflects on the impact of discovering that a police spy had stolen his dead brother’s identity to infiltrate two leftwing organisations, and to deceive a woman into a sexual relationship.

_The Undercover Police Scandal: Love and Lies Exposed is available now on ITVX_

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## Additional Information

Anushka also talks to Guardian investigative editor **Paul Lewis** and Guardian investigative reporter **Rob Evans** about their decade-long investigation with activists to uncover the activities of the . Over four decades,  were given fake identities to closely monitor the inner workings of . Some of those identities had been stolen from dead children to lend credibility to their aliases – and some officers, , even visited the graves of the children whose identities they were using.

The work of activists and the Guardian has resulted in a judge-led public inquiry on a statutory level with other significant inquiries, such as Lord Saville’s  and the Chilcot examination .

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