Last week, two women, ‘Jodie’ and ‘Sarah’, settled their civil claims against their previous employer, the chief constable of Gwent police. This arose from failures by Gwent police force, to respond appropriately to allegations of domestic violence they both separately made against the same more senior officer. The settlement included damages and personal apologies, as well as a public statement from Deputy Chief Constable Amanda Blakeman acknowledging the failures and harm caused. This victory followed a very long struggle for accountability going back ten years.
The two women were both probationary officers when they met (former) PC Clarke Joslyn who was involved in their training. Joslyn relied on his more senior position to groom them into relationships with him. Both were then subjected to domestic abuse by PC Joslyn, and eventually reported him. Their allegations were not properly investigated, and instead they were subject to victimisation by colleagues of Joslyn and left unsupported. It later transpired that several other women had also been victims of Joslyn over a period of years, yet he remained a serving officer, with easy access to young female trainees, until misconduct proceedings were finally brought against him in 2018. He resigned shortly before a panel found his conduct amounted to gross misconduct at a hearing in 2019.
The two cases form part of a dossier of evidence compiled by Centre for Women’s Justice in a national police super-complaint on police perpetrated abuse, currently under investigation. Publicity about the super-complaint has led to approximately 160 women coming forward who have suffered similar experiences. The cases include a range of allegations of abuse by female officers, like Jodie and Sarah and by women not in the police themselves but who were married or in relationships with serving police officers. Women describe a range of disturbing issues: fear of reporting; serious failures of investigation; officers accused using police powers to intimidate or discredit victims; other officer colleagues covering up or assisting in intimidating victims; officers using their police officer status in family law proceedings; manipulation of evidence to get women arrested; and police officer victims being subject to misconduct proceedings and sacked.
‘Freya’ one of the first woman we worked with, put forward the idea to bring other victims together to explore collective action to raise awareness of the extent of police perpetrated abuse and to challenge systemic failings. Last year Freya was awarded the Emma Humphreys Memorial Prize/CWJ award for her efforts in raising awareness of the issues and seeking to bring about systemic change. In her acceptance speech Freya said,
“I have severe PTSD after my marriage to a police officer. He was violent and abusive, he pushed me out of a moving car when I was five months pregnant, he raped me when I filed for divorce because he could see he was losing me. He put his hands round my throat and also our young son…I feared he would kill me, and who could I report to? No-one would believe me and what if he found out? These are common worries for DV victims, but it is more pronounced when the perpetrator is a police officer, due to the nature of the public office, there is a societal expectation that police officers are the honest ones. And why wouldn’t he find out when the police officers you report to are his colleagues….
When I started to look at other stories I began to see patterns, police officers and child sexual abuse images, both viewing and making, police officers targeting teenage girls for sex, police officers targeting female victims that had come to report other crimes, … “
“As a sexual predator and abuser of women, Couzens was far from exceptional…Even as a police officer murderer, Couzens was not unique.”
The issue of police perpetrated abuse has taken on national political significance since the revelations around the murder of Sarah Everard by serving police officer Wayne Couzens who used his powers as an officer to kidnap her and whose colleagues reportedly referred to him as “the rapist”. Cressida Dick described him as a “wrong un”, but as our police super-complaint and the myriad of recent media explorations of the issue have shown, as a sexual predator and abuser of women, Couzens was far from exceptional. For example, in the last week it has come to light that another Metropolitan Police officer working in the same small unit as Couzens, PC David Carrick, has been charged with a further 13 counts of violence against women, including rape, false imprisonment and coercive and controlling behaviour. Even as a police officer murderer, Couzens was not unique. The femicide census reveals that at least 15 women have been killed by serving or former police officers since records began in 2009.
So what needs to be done? In early October, Priti Patel, the Home Secretary announced a public inquiry into “issues raised by the conviction of Wayne Couzens”. This could be an opportunity to undertake a deep, searching analysis of institutionalised misogyny within policing. It might even try to address why so few women have trust in the police and would think carefully before reporting a crime of sexual or domestic violence. As some have described it, a Stephen Lawrence type inquiry looking at the treatment of women. However, so far the government have resisted calls to put the inquiry on a statutory footing and the Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) with the backing of over 20 national women sector organisations have now threatened judicial review proceedings to challenge the resistance to ensuring this is not a lost opportunity.
Whilst we await a further decision, the following are some steps which we believe need to be taken to begin to tackle the problem:
Institute a zero-tolerance approach to sexism and misogyny in the police and all criminal justice institutions
Create an independent robust and transparent process for reporting and investigating allegations of abuse against police officers
Use an external police force or alternative investigative agency to investigate all cases of domestic and sexual violence by police officers
Treat abuse by officers whilst off-duty as potential misconduct which discredits the police service and undermines public confidence
Remove officers accused of domestic or sexual abuse from roles working with victims of abuse, regardless of the outcome of investigations
Criminalise the formation of sexual relationships by undercover police officers and officers who are in contact with a woman simply because she has reported a crime
Ensure protections for whistle-blowers and set up a robust system for colleagues with concerns about the conduct of their fellow police officers and encourage officers to use them
We should not forget the power of collective action and the impact of many voices of those with lived experience coming together.
As Freya said,
“I have never been able to get any type of justice, the only person they protected was him…
…I always wanted to bring women together who had been abused by police instead of protected, I wanted to see if there were patterns in our stories that could make a joint action of some kind…and the women did come forward, we are stronger together…we hope it will result in systemic changes throughout every police force – changes so that no other women need to go through what we have…”