A Hounslow councillor and former police detective has been cleared of indecently assaulting a teenage boy.

Gurpal Virdi was acquitted by a jury, on Friday (July 31) at Southwark Crown Court, of indecently assaulting a male prisoner and misconduct in public office on or before November 7 1986.

The court had heard allegations the 56-year-old, who retired from the Metropolitan Police Service in 2012 and was elected to Hounslow Council last year, used an extendable baton to indecently assault the young detainee in the back of a prison van.

But his defence counsel told jurors, during the week-long trial, that type of baton was not introduced until several years after the alleged offence.

Mr Virdi claims the charges were part of a long-running vendetta against him by Scotland Yard.

Mr Virdi won an employment tribunal in 2000 after falsely being accused by his bosses of sending racist hate mail to himself and his colleagues.

Speaking after the latest trial, Mr Virdi said he believed he was still paying the price of standing up to racism within the police force.

“It’s been hell having this hanging over my head but thankfully the jury saw through everything and made the right decision,” he said.

“I’ve suffered harassment [by the Metropolitan Police] ever since the 1998 case [the date he was falsely accused of sending the hate mail] because I refused to sign confidentiality clauses.

“There’s been harassment and victimisation and this is typical of how they’ve behaved, proceeding with the case on the basis of malicious allegations.”

Mr Virdi, of Firs Drive, Cranford, had been issued with a court summons in April last year, less than a month before he was due to stand in the local elections.

The father-of-two was suspended by the Labour Party and elected as an independent for the ward of Cranford.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Fiona Taylor, of the Met’s Directorate of Professional Standards, said: “Once allegations such as these were raised by the victim it was only right that we investigated them thoroughly and impartially.

“That investigation was entirely focused on securing what evidence was available, with respect to what were undeniably very serious allegations. It would not have been proper to proceed in any other way.

“We presented the evidence to the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) who decided the allegations and evidence should be heard by a jury.”