A twist in the tale as Archer warder quits

The officer in charge of security at the open prison where Jeffrey Archer was being held has been forced to resign after he and a policewoman had lunch with the disgraced peer.

The prison officer, Paul Hocking, 57, and the constable were off duty during their 90-minute meal at Zucchini's Italian restaurant in Lincoln on Wednesday. But Mr Hocking broke the rules by failing to ask permission from his governor at North Sea Camp jail to meet an inmate, the Prison Service said.

An internal inquiry has been set up into the actions of the female constable, who was not on official business, Lincolnshire Police confirmed yesterday. She is understood to have known Mr Hocking from her previous work at the jail. Archer, 62, who is serving a four-year sentence for perjury and perverting the course of justice, was on day release at the time.

The former deputy chairman of the Conservative Party has been moved from his open prison to the tougher closed regime at Lincoln prison, a category-B jail, for attending a party held by the former Tory minister Gillian Shephard in breach of the terms of his weekend release.