Did they vet the wrong Ray Lewis?

There is a quite remarkable item in Londoner’s Diary today:

RUMOUR reaches the Londoner that the reason Boris Johnson's office failed to pick up on the fact former Deputy Mayor Ray Lewis was not a Justice of the Peace is that it conducted a background check on a different Ray Lewis who is a Justice of the Peace in East London. The former deputy mayor for young people, Ray Lewis, gave the Mayor the impression he was a Justice of the Peace, a fact which the Mayor highlighted at his press conference last Thursday.

The next day the Ministry of Justice said "he is not and has never been a magistrate". It subsequently transpired that the deputy mayor had been recommendedfor appointment as a JP and the appointment was still waiting to be ratified.

Why further checks were not undertaken to establish whether Ray Lewis, a JP in East London, was the same Ray Lewis who held mayoral office at City Hall is not clear.

There are approximately 29,500 JPs currently serving in the UK. The Ministry of Justice said they would "never provide any details for magistrates and certainly wouldn't comment". No comment was available from the Mayor's office. Can the other Ray Lewis step forward, please?