Man from Harborough district accused of fraud blames David Cameron and Boris Johnson for failure of charity single

Gary Gardner, 56, organised charity truck-pull events for the murdered Fusilier's son Jack and invited his family to attend.

Little Jack was just two when Lee was murdered in May 2013 by Islamic extremists in London.

Gardner is accused of blowing up to £5,000 of the proceeds on a charity single that generated just £200.

Leicester Crown Court heard Gardner blamed the failure of the single, called "Miss You Machine", on Tory politicians Boris Johnson and David Cameron.

In his police statement read to the jury, he said: “The single wasn’t a success because of the bureaucracy of Boris Johnson and the Prime Minister and the press.

“They were making out they didn’t want to upset any Muslims.

“Bureaucrats told people to back off because it could have been political, even though it [the single] was a message from a little boy to his dad.

“There’s a lot of singles at my house that were never sold.

“It probably cost £4,000 to £5,000 to record the single. We didn’t make any money from sales. We got about £200 from downloading.”

In the interview, Detective Constable Andrew Cree, of Leicestershire Police, accused Gardner of using the charity money to "prop up" his own back account.

He told him: “You were already overdrawn by £600 - that’s when you transferred £431 from the trust account to your own account.

“It looks like you are propping up your account.

“You have taken the money for Lee Rigby’s son Jack and put it into your own account which was already £1,000 overdrawn.”

Gardner replied: “No I wouldn’t do that. There’s no way in the world I used the money to prop up my account.”

Gardner, of Medbourne, denies three counts of fraud. The trial continues.