U.K. police say they received letter with claims against Meghan’s father, wasn’t shared with other law enforcement

A letter making a “number of claims” against the father of Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, was received by the Metropolitan Police in 2019, a Scotland Yard spokesperson confirmed to CBS News on Saturday.

Police said they passed the letter to the office of the Duke and Duchess “for their awareness,” however, the details of the allegations made in the letter were not shared with other law enforcement agencies.

On Friday, it was reported that Meghan’s estranged father, Thomas Markle, is under investigation by authorities in the Philippines for alleged possession of child sexual abuse materials.

A spokesperson for the Philippine National Police told CBS News in a statement Saturday that they launched an investigation after Markle’s personal items were turned over to law enforcement by his son, Thomas Markle Jr.

“At this point, investigators are looking into the nature and origin of the materials and whether these may be connected to any violation of law,” Col. Allen Rae Co said in a statement. “U.S. authorities have also offered assistance should Philippine authorities determine that their support is needed as the investigation progresses.”

The British tabloid The Sun was the first to report the allegations against Markle Sr. The report said the younger Markle allegedly discovered child abuse materials in storage boxes at his father’s home in the Philippines.

The Daily Mail reported Friday that Markle had denied the allegations against him.

Meghan, who recently moved back to Britain with her husband Prince Harry and their children, said in a statement sent to CBS News on Friday that she was “deeply distressed” by reports about her father. She said she had been aware of the allegations against him since 2018 and that the allegations were shared with U.K. authorities at the time.

“In 2018, a letter was sent to the Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection. That letter was subsequently shared with me. It made troubling and disturbing allegations against my father and I was given assurances that these were being investigated,” her Friday statement said. 

Meghan said she had distanced herself from her father in an effort to protect her children.

“I hope it can now be understood that, despite certain media publications’ distortion over the years, any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him to have contact with our children, was for one reason: to protect them,” she said.

Responding to Saturday’s developments dating the letter to 2019, a spokesman for the duchess told CBS News partner BBC News that “any discrepancy of a few months” was “an understandable consequence of that passage of time.”

Scotland Yard said Saturday that Met Police will be reviewing the handling of this matter in 2019 and deciding whether to refer itself to the police watchdog.