Danny Baker to face no further police action over royal baby chimpanzee tweet

Police are to take no further action after reviewing an allegation concerning a tweet by broadcaster Danny Baker about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s baby.

Scotland Yard said officers had reviewed the comments which resulted in Baker being sacked from the BBC and ruled it was not a criminal offence.

Baker posted the tweet featuring a picture of a chimpanzee in a bowler hat - which he captioned: “Royal baby leaves hospital” - last Wednesday, the same day Harry and Meghan posed with their new arrival, Archie Mountbatten-Windsor.

I caused outrage and within hours he was sacked by the BBC for his ‘serious error of judgment’.

Baker, 61, who hosted a weekly show on Radio 5 Live, immediately apologised saying: “I chose the wrong photo to illustrate a joke. Disastrously so.”

He insisted he was not a racist claiming it was a “genuine, naive and catastrophic mistake” and a “crass & regrettable blunder.”

He wrote: “In attempting to lampoon privilege and the news cycle I went to a file of goofy pictures and saw the chimp dressed as a Lord and thought, ‘That’s the one!’

“Had I kept searching I might have chosen General Tom Thumb or even a baby in a crown. But I didn’t. God knows I wish had.

“Minutes later I was alerted by followers that this royal baby was of course mixed race and waves of panic and revulsion washed over me.”

On Thursday last week the Met said it had received an allegation about the social media post and specialist officers were assessing the comments.

Today a Met spokeswoman said: “Having reviewed the comments made, we do not consider that a criminal threshold has been met and as such we will be taking no further action.”