The judge told Lord Archer he was guilty of the mo

The judge told Lord Archer he was guilty of the most serious case of perjury he had seen as he jailed him for a total of four years.

Mr Justice Potts said it would have been ‘unlikely in the extreme’ for him to win the 1987 libel case if his deception had been known.

Archer, who was ordered to pay pnds stlg 175,000 costs, remained stony-faced throughout and looked around in confusion when told to go down.

He did not look at his family sitting just a few feet to his right.

Lady Archer had closed her eyes while the guilty verdicts were announced.

Mr Justice Potts told the disgraced peer: ‘The jury have convicted you on counts one, three, five and six of this indictment on clear evidence in my view.

‘I take the view having listened to the evidence over many days that these charges represent as serious an offence of perjury as I have had experience of and as I have been able to find in the books.

‘The fact is that in January 1987 you set out dishonestly to manipulate a proceedings which you had chosen to institute against the Star newspaper.

‘You did so I am satisfied certainly from 8th January when you required Mrs Peppiatt to obtain a blank Economist diary for 1986.

‘And you went on choosing your man with care to incite Ted Francis to write those letters to your solicitor setting out the false alibi knowing that he was in need of money for his TV project and I have not the slightest doubt that your knowledge of the world knowing he was the sort of person who might succumb to your persuasion when you told him that your were prepared to underwrite something you had not been prepared to underwrite before.

‘It went on from then.

You drew Mrs Peppiatt, your employee, into this, a woman who had come to you after a broken marriage with young children to maintain, and you required her, I am highly satisfied to forge entries in the blank diary that you subsequently put into the legal process.

‘Thereafter you swore an affidavit dishonestly as to documents and finally and crucially you gave false evidence in court.

‘Sentencing you Lord Archer gives me no pleasure at all, I can assure you.

Very little in this case could be said to give any sensible person pleasure.

‘It has been a extremely distasteful case.

‘It is said that all this is long ago.

But you know Lord Archer, when you swore your affidavit seeking a speedy trial in March 1987 you said regarding the allegations made against you “They are peculiarly unpleasant and I am anxious to fight them at the earliest opportunity.

I am prevented from having any opportunity to resume my political career.

”

‘Well you went on to win, having persuaded the judge and jury of your cause and I cannot overlook the fact that there is evidence before me that had the court and jury in the July of 1987 known the facts it is unlikely in the extreme that you would have succeeded.

‘Since then I cannot overlook the fact that you have gone from strength to strength.

You resumed your political career and at some point you were ennobled and became a member of the House of Lords.

‘That has to be taken into account.

I repeat these are in my judgement serious matters.

I have got to pass individual sentence but I look at the totality of the matter.

‘I regard the way you obtained the services of Mrs Peppiatt very seriously indeed.

And of course I regard as most serious of all the culmination of it all when you gave evidence before Mr Justice Caulfield and the jury.

‘

He sentenced Archer to two years on count one of asking Ted Francis to provide an alibi.

Archer was jailed for four years for count three of obtaining the forged diary, three years for perjury in the affidavit and four years for perjury at the 1987 libel trial.

He was ordered to pay pnds stlg 175,000 to cover prosecution and investigation costs and told that if he failed to pay it after six months he would be sentenced to 12 months imprisonment.

Archer was acquitted of count eight of forging the Economist Diary and handing it to solicitors.

But the judge accepted he had asked his secretary Angela Peppiatt to buy the blank 1986 Economist Diary.

Mitigating for the fallen statesman defence QC Nicholas Purnell said the offence happened when Lord Archer was 14 years younger.

He said the case had taken nearly two years to come to trial when a police investigation was launched following an article by the News of the World in November 1999.

‘Lord Archer and his family for the past two years have been undertaken by extraordinary tensions which the press and media have followed the progress of the investigation against the glare of publicity which is unprecedented and has subjected particularly Lord Archer to the most intense stress.

‘In 33 years at the bar have I ever encountered in quite such circumstances that the arrival and departure of Lord Archer and every single aspect of the case has undergone the stress of public attention.

Of telling lies during his 1987 libel trial, Mr Purnell said it was both wrong and foolish and described his conduct as a ‘great tragedy’.

‘He has, over a long and impressive career, given much of himself to the political party he supported, but more importantly to charitable claims and not for the benefit of his own financial successes.

‘Throughout the last two years he has been blighted by the consequences of the Archer/Francis telephone call which resulted in disqualification as a member from the Conservative party.

‘This is a man now aged 61 whose contributions have been real and considerable to the public and welfare at large.

‘

Mr Purnell added that the ‘precarious’ health of Archer’s mother, who fell ill at the time legal arguments, were being made before the trial began – and her death was ‘a personal anxiety which added to his stress’.

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Scotland Yard may investigate Lady Archer’s evidence at the Old Bailey about the existence of a real A4 diary for 1986, it emerged.

The jury found that Lord Archer forged an A4 diary instead of using his secretary Angela Peppiatt’s official A5 diary in the 1987 libel trial.

In defence of her husband, Lady Archer had told the court she had never seen Mrs Peppiatt’s diary and believed the A4 diary was the real one.

Today Mr Justice Potts asked whether Archer had compounded his guilt by having his wife give evidence.

Lady Archer only remembered the A4 diary after Mrs Peppiatt had given her evidence to the court although she insisted she mentioned it to the police in December.

Jurors discovered today that in their absence on Day 18 of the trial, defence QC Nicholas Purnell told the judge Lady Archer had a ‘specific recollection of an A4 diary’ – a matter he ‘should have put to her’.

In light of this information, Scotland Yard’s Superintendent Jeff Hunt, who led the investigation, said outside the court: ‘We will take time to consider the judge’s comments very carefully.

‘

He paid tribute to Mrs Peppiatt saying her evidence was ‘very important’ in winning the convictions.

He added: ‘We are satisfied with the jury’s verdict and with the sentence.

This was a complicated inquiry in which our team of officers had to overcome a range of issues going back 14 years.

‘

Ted Francis later insisted on shaking hands with all the security staff before he left the building.

His case throughout the trial has been paid by the News of the World and he was prevented from making any other comment than this brief statement.

Mr Francis said: ‘I would just like to say as you can imagine I am enormously relieved that the whole business is over and done with.

‘I would also like to say a great deal of thanks to my wife, family, friends for all who supported me and for never doubting.

‘I would, believe it or not, like to thank the News of the World for their help too.

Thankyou.

‘

He would not say anything about his former friend Jeffrey Archer.

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