LONDON, Nov 2: Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II faced uncomfortable scrutiny on Saturday after her sudden intervention cleared a former butler to her daughter-in-law Princess Diana of stealing hundreds of her possessions.

“It is hard to think of many court cases that have done more to damage the credibility of as many British institutions with one single blow,” said the conservative Times.

The left-of-centre Guardian suggested that the palace may have “blinked first in a high stakes poker game over the evidence the former butler would have given in court”.

It asked whether perhaps the man “walked free because the palace (was) desperate to protect the post-Diana rehabilitation of the Prince of Wales on which the monarchy depends”.

Paul Burrell, 44, the butler Diana once described as her “rock”, was cleared of all charges on Friday following the disclosure of a crucial conversation he had with the queen in 1997.

“The queen has come through for me,” said a smiling Burrell as he left the Old Bailey court in central London.

But the British press, which gave blanket coverage to the case, raised thorny questions about the role of the palace, the Crown Prosecution Service and the police in handling the affair.

The Independent said the queen had made an outright “error of judgement” by failing to come forward sooner with the information.

The prosecution dropped all charges against Burrell after it was revealed that he had told the queen he had kept some items belonging to Diana for safekeeping after her death in a Paris car crash in 1997.—AFP