[2] Born into modest circumstances in Fenton, Stoke on Trent, Bettaney later attended Pembroke College, Oxford, where he studied English in 1969-72,[3][4] and was allegedly known for his admiration for Adolf Hitler and for singing the Horst-Wessel-Lied in local public houses.
[5] Working here, an outstation based in Gower Street, London, rather than at MI5's then main building in Curzon Street off Berkeley Square, he took a large number of secret documents home with him from the office, before trying to hand over highlights to the KGB's London rezident (Head of KGB Station or rezidentura), General Arkady V. Guk, by dropping the documentation through the letterbox of Guk's house, Bettaney knowing the address via his work.
Gordievsky informed MI6 and the British authorities managed to identify and arrest Bettaney[4] at his home in September 1983, where he had been preparing to fly to Vienna and hand over more secrets to the Soviets.
[5] There has been put forward an alternative view of the above, to wit that, far from incompetently pushing secret materials through Guk's letterbox, "[Bettaney] delivered a suitably cryptic message for the Soviet embassy's KGB staff.
[5] A further offence of using an out-of-date railway season ticket followed, and although Bettaney had failed to declare it, as he was required to do, he knew it would be disclosed during his next routine security screening, which would inevitably lead to his dismissal.