PRITI Patel begged the US to take on the prosecution of a man previously suspected of being a member of the so-called Beatles Isis cell, a court was told.

The then-home secretary’s “extraordinary” intervention was made in a legal argument over Aine Davis’s case at the Old Bailey in March. 

The court heard British authorities connived in the deportation of the Londoner from Turkey with a view to him being extradited onwards to the United States to face fresh charges there.

In 2022, Ms Patel was said to have veered into Alice in Wonderland territory when she made the phone call to a US attorney general.

Ultimately, the plan was abandoned and Mr Davis was arrested and charged with terror offences on his arrival in Britain from Turkey last summer.

Reporting restrictions over these details expired after Mr Davis pleaded guilty at London’s Old Bailey to possessing a firearm for terrorist purposes and two charges of funding terrorism today. 

Defence barrister Mark Summers KC said British officials learned that prosecutors in New York were seeking to extradite Mr Davis to the US and charge him with providing material support to Isis on June 18 last year.

The following month, prosecutors in Virginia clarified that they were not looking to put him on trial as a member of the “Beatles” cell, saying there were only three members.

By then, Mr Summers suggested Britain was “begging the US to take over the prosecution of Mr Davis.”

Mr Summers said: “The personal involvement of the home secretary trying to persuade a foreign country to prosecute a UK national is frankly extraordinary.

“It may have come to nothing but was seriously abusive. Trying to persuade a third state to prosecute one of our nationals is seriously irregular, and to facilitate his extradition there via the UK is also seriously irregular.

“The proper route would have been extradition from Turkey to America. That was assessed to be unrealistic — they’ve fallen out at an international level.

“It’s difficult to overstate the illegality and irregularity of what was under contemplation for some time.”

He added: “The UK had connived in procuring the deportation order from Turkey with subjective ulterior motives.”

In August, Mr Davis was deported back to Britain, met at Luton airport by counterterrorism police and later charged with three terrorism offences.

He will be sentenced on November 13.