Bogus secret agent jailed after fooling police and his wife

A fantasist who duped his wife and the police into believing he was a James Bond-style secret agent was jailed for two years yesterday.

Michael Newitt, 41, said he was special operations commander with MI5, the Foreign Office and police counter-terrorism units. He told officers at Hinckley police station, in Leicestershire, that he was "Commander Newitt" with the Metropolitan Police and claimed he was on a counter-terrorism operation in the county. He even tricked an officer into giving him a new pocket book.

Newitt carried fake ID documents in a leather wallet emblazoned with a crown and used the letters CMG after his name – the high-ranking award presented to James Bond in the story From Russia with Love.

The failed businessman, from Osgathorpe, near Loughborough, even fitted his car with blue strobe lights and a siren and used it to arrest a suspected drink-driver on the M6 before handing him in to local police.



Newitt's wife was also taken in. She said she believed the father of five when he said he was off on "special missions". But Leicester Crown Court heard that the defendant was a "con man and fantasist" whose life had been "a spectacular illusion".

Newitt was facing ruin after being prosecuted for failing to keep proper accounts for his technological products business. He was struggling to meet payments on his car and mooring fees for a £200,000 motor cruiser he owned. His offending began when his boat was removed from its mooring in December 2006 and he pretended he was an undercover intelligence officer and demanded that the cruiser was returned.

He produced a fake ID, baton, and handcuffs and claimed to be an undercover police officer when his old Volvo was being repossessed. A police officer believed his story and signed his notebook to acknowledge the confidentiality of his job. But Newitt was finally arrested when a police officer with a military background became suspicious of his commander title.

Newitt was jailed for committing fake ID cards offences, fraudulently claiming to be a police officer, carrying two imitation firearms, a replica Glock 9mm pistol and commando rifle, falsely suggesting he was a police officer and possessing articles of police uniform.