On this day: how Queen Elizabeth’s dramatic intervention brought the most sensational royal trial in a century to a halt

It was the trial that shook the royal family to its core – and none more so than Prince Charles.

Just five years after Diana’s death, her butler Paul Burrell was charged with the theft of a total of 310 items, allegedly stolen from Kensington Palace, home of his former employer.

Although public interest was high and Burrell’s testimony at the Old Bailey was eagerly anticipated, the prospect of an angry former royal insider in the witness box was a matter of anxiety for Prince Charles.

What would he say?

Imagine the relief when, on November 1, 2002, the case was unexpectedly dismissed in its entirety – thanks to a dramatic intervention by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

Burrell was accused of acquiring and selling the princess’s assets. Now he had been acquitted under very astonishing circumstances.

Burrell, now 64, worked for the royal family for 21 years, starting as the Queen’s footman and eventually becoming Diana’s butler for a decade until her death in 1997.

The case against him was based on the fact that he had not told anyone that he had kept the princess’s belongings.

However, Burrell claimed that he had told the Queen that he would take custody of some of Diana’s belongings, and that she had agreed.

Despite serious misgivings among some senior members of the royal family, the prosecution continued in October 2002.

But suddenly something remarkable happened: at 8.30am on day 11 of the trial, Commander John Yates of Scotland Yard appeared and said he had just spoken to Sir Michael Peat. Peat had said to him, “Her Majesty has had a memory.”

On October 25, 2002, the Queen, Charles and Prince Philip drove together to St Paul’s Cathedral for a memorial service for the victims of the Bali bombing.

As she drove past the Old Bailey, she asked why there was a crowd outside. Charles replied that Paul Burrell was on trial. The queen apparently did not know he was being persecuted.

She then said that Burrell had sought an audience with her a few years earlier to explain that he was taking care of some of Diana’s papers, and she had agreed to him doing so.

Given the importance to the prosecution case of whether or not Burrell had told anyone that he had taken items from Kensington Palace, the relevance of this information was quickly brought to the attention of the police.

The prosecution’s barrister, William Boyce QC, later told the Old Bailey: ‘In all the circumstances the prosecution has concluded that the current trial is no longer viable because it has proceeded on the false premise that Mr Burrell never someone had told him that he had everything for safekeeping.

“The prosecution is of the opinion that if the defense were to request that the jury be dismissed, although this would be a matter for My Lady, the prosecution would not be able to oppose that request.”

After hearing submissions from the prosecution and defense the judge, Mrs Justice Rafferty, dismissed the jury and told Mr Burrell he was free to go on November 1, 2002.

Had the trial gone ahead, the former butler would have been called to testify and may have been questioned about his time in the Queen’s service and that of Princess Diana.

Outside court, Mr Burrell said: “The Queen has come to see me. I’m excited, I’m so excited.’

It had indeed been a turbulent two years for the butler, who was woken at 6.50am in January 2001 by Chief Inspector Maxine de Brunner and three other police officers.

Scotland Yard raided his Cheshire home at dawn following the arrest of Princess Margaret’s butler Harold Brown, who was caught selling a bejeweled 2ft Arabian dhow, a wedding gift to Charles and Diana from the emir of Bahrain.

After he was arrested and later acquitted, he told police it had been supplied by Burrell.

“Do you have stuff from Kensington Palace in this house?” Burrell was asked.

“No,” he lied. He was subsequently arrested.

As it turned out, the full details of what happened that morning would never be heard in court.

But they were later put together by investigative writer Tom Bower, author of Rebel Prince: the Power, Passion and Defiance of Prince Charles.

What the detectives discovered, he determined, far exceeded their expectations.

The rooms were filled with paintings, drawings, china and photographs that had clearly belonged to Diana and her children William and Harry.

Other items included signed photos of Diana, the princess’s daily personal notes to William at school and clothes of hers – including a blue-ribbon hat she had worn during her visit with Prince Charles to South Korea in 1992.

Bower wrote in The Daily Mail: ‘As Burrell’s sobs increased, an officer shouted from the attic: ‘It’s full of boxes, wall to wall!’

‘The boxes were torn open: inside were bags, blouses, dresses, nightgowns, underwear, shoes, jumpers, suits and hats that had belonged to Diana, including a blue ribbon hat she had worn during her visit with Prince Charles to South Korea in 1992.

‘Late that afternoon, officers filled a truck sent from London with 2,000 items that De Brunner said had been illegally removed.

‘The princess, she believed, would never have given away such personal material, and certainly not in such quantities.

‘Yet a large part of Diana’s possessions remained in the house. But without an order from Scotland Yard to seize everything belonging to the family or seal the house as a crime scene, nothing more could be done.

“I want white lilies on my coffin,” Burrell wailed as he was escorted to the waiting police car.

That year, Mr Burrell was accused of stealing a total of 310 items, reportedly worth £5 million, allegedly stolen from the Princess’s home before her death.

He denied any impropriety and claimed the items were given to him by Diana.

In the years since the trial, Burrell has had a lucrative career as a royal commentator and reality show participant, but in 2008, during Diana’s inquest, it emerged that he had secretly copied letters between her and other members of the royal family.

In his controversial memoir Spare, Prince Harry accused the former butler of ‘milking’ his mother’s death for money with his book A Royal Duty.

“Mama’s former butler had a tell-all that didn’t really mean anything,” he wrote.

“It was just one man’s self-justifying, self-centered version of events.

‘My mother once called this butler a dear friend and trusted him implicitly. We also. Now this. He milked her disappearance for money. It made my blood boil.”

Now retired after closing his floristry in 2019, Burrell revealed earlier this year that he is suffering from prostate cancer.