Jeremy Thorpe after discovery by the "Daily Mail". Bessell gave muddled accounts of his involvement with Scott, but insisted that his former chief was innocent of any wrongdoing. On 16 March 1976 Newton's trial began at Exeter Crown Court, where Scott repeated his allegations against Thorpe despite the efforts of the prosecution's lawyers to silence him. Newton was found guilty and sentenced to two years' imprisonment, but did not incriminate Thorpe. The erosion of public support for the Liberal Party continued with several poor by-election results in March, which the former leader Grimond attributed to increasing lack of confidence in Thorpe. On
Jeremy Thorpe plenty of cliffhangers, especially once the trial begins". A British three-part television series, also titled ""A Very English Scandal", based on Preston's novel, aired on the BBC in May 2018, directed by Stephen Frears, with actor Hugh Grant starring as Thorpe and Ben Whishaw as Norman Scott. The first episode drew a viewership of 4.6 million. Following the final installment of "A Very English Scandal", the BBC aired a documentary called "The Jeremy Thorpe Scandal", created in 1979 by BBC Panorama journalist Tom Mangold, which had been planned for release after the anticipated conviction of Thorpe, but which was then