Former British MP David Warburton dies aged 59
A former British MP David Warburton, who stood down after a sex and drugs scandal, has died aged 59,News.Az reports, citing The Telegraph.
David Warburton was pronounced dead last week after paramedics were called to his flat in Chelsea, central London.
Mr Warburton’s death is being treated by police as unexplained but not suspicious.
A teacher and an entrepreneur before he entered politics, he served as the MP for Somerton and Frome from 2015 to 2023.
Mr Warburton was suspended by the Conservatives in 2022 following allegations that he sexually assaulted women and abused cocaine.
Two women spoke anonymously to The Sunday Times and alleged that Mr Warburton groped them. A third alleged that he “pushed her towards his bedroom” and asked her to order cocaine on his behalf.
Mr Warburton was subsequently admitted to a psychiatric hospital “for severe shock and stress” and his wife said the experience had been “sheer hell”.
In June 2023, Mr Warburton quit as an MP and claimed he was denied a fair hearing by a parliamentary harassment watchdog looking into allegations of unwanted advances.
In his resignation letter, he said he had been left with “no choice” but to provoke “the upheaval of a by-election”, adding: “It is my hope that, in so doing, I can freely illuminate the methods of an oversight system not fit for purpose, so that friends and colleagues in the House can see the perverted process by which their own judgement may at any time be freighted.”
He continued to deny the harassment claims but admitted taking cocaine after drinking “incredibly potent” Japanese whisky with a third woman.
Mr Warburton claimed he was secretly filmed and photographed following a late-night vote in the House of Commons, saying he was “set up” but had been “naive and incredibly stupid”.
The Conservatives lost the subsequent by-election in Somerset and Frome to the Liberal Democrats.
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