Sacked Radio Two DJ Scott Mills was interviewed by police following the drugs death of his boyfriend 26 years ago.
Mitchell Berger, 21, from Barry, South Glamorgan, was found unconscious with two other men at a flat in Holborn, central London in March 2000, the night of the Brit Awards.
The others were saved by medics, but doctors could do nothing for Mr Berger and he died of an overdose.
Police found an address book in his flat which contained contact numbers for Scott, then 26, who was preparing his Radio 1 ‘early-bird’ show backstage at the Brits.
Mitchell, who worked in a gay bay in Soho, had met the DJ ten months earlier, according to Mills, writing in his 2012 autobiography, Love You, Bye: My Story.
The Metropolitan Police said at the time the death was not treated as suspicious, but Mills was interviewed by officers.
The revelation follows the news that Mills was interviewed under caution by officers from the Metropolitan Police in relation to serious historical sex offences against a teenage boy in 2016.
The Met’s case was dropped in 2018 due to lack of evidence.
Sacked Radio Two DJ Scott Mills was interviewed by police following the drugs death of his boyfriend 26 years ago
Mills recalled the night of Mitch’s death in his book that Mitch was ‘the funniest, most handsome bloke with the loveliest family.’
Shortly before his death the couple, who lived together, had been on a two-week break in Miami, which Mills described as ‘one of the best holidays I’ve ever been on.’
He described the moment when police broke the news of Mitch’s death: ‘
‘I was woken up by a phone call. It was the kind of call everyone dreads. The police were waiting in reception and wanted to talk to me.
‘Something bad had happened, but I didn’t know what. I threw my clothes on and rushed downstairs. When I got to reception, a policeman took me aside. I just wanted him to tell me what had happened, but it seemed to take an age before he finally got the words out.
‘Mitch had died. Everything stopped. I felt a huge pain in my stomach and I couldn’t hear anything that was being said. I just stood staring at the policeman in disbelief, not taking in what he was telling me.
‘The policeman tried to explain what had happened but I wasn’t really listening. I just heard something about drugs and an accident. Nothing was making sense, it felt like my whole life had fallen apart in an instant.’
It was a year later that Mills publicly ‘came out’ as gay. He said the death of his friend sent him spiralling into an abyss of drink and depression.
He wrote: ‘I returned to work and tried to get things back to normal, but they weren’t normal. I missed Mitch terribly, and it’s fair to say my drinking got out of control for a while.’
The Metropolitan Police inquiry between 2016 and 2019 is believed to have been part of Operation Winter Key, linked to Operation Yewtree — the specialist unit set up to probe high-profile personalities accused of sex crimes in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal, and the victim, from the South of England, was reportedly under the age of 16.
The Met said in a statement yesterday: ‘In December 2016, the Met began an investigation following a referral from another police force. The investigation related to allegations of serious sexual offences against a teenage boy.
‘These were reported to taken place between 1997 and 2000. As part of these enquiries, a man who was in his 40s at the time of the interview, was questioned by police under caution in July 2018.
‘A full file of evidence was submitted to the Crown Prosecution Service, who determined the evidential threshold had not been met to bring charges. Following this advice, the investigation was closed in May 2019.’
The revelations coms after Mills was sacked from his BBC Radio 2 job on Monday over allegations relating to his ‘personal conduct’.
