Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ) welcomes the publication (18 July 2024) of the Independent Inquiry report by Dame Vera Baird KC into the experiences of people who are arrested and taken into custody by Greater Manchester Police with a focus on women and girls. CWJ provided analysis from our own evidence and work around the criminalisation of victims of domestic abuse which is referenced in the report.
Harriet Wistrich, Director of Centre for Women’s Justice, stated:
“Dame Vera Baird KC’s thorough report on Greater Manchester Police provides graphic evidence of the unlawful arrest and detention of victims of domestic abuse, sexual violence and child sexual exploitation. Reviewing evidence from both victims and police records, Baird gives an unflinching account of the frightening and degrading treatment of women in police custody, including inappropriate strip searching and wilful failures to meet their basic needs.
“The police wield considerable power, which has manifestly been abused in these cases; the misogynistic bullying and mistreatment described in the report makes difficult reading and must be urgently addressed.
“The cases uncovered in this Review add to the already significant evidence of toxic misogyny and abuse of power at the heart of policing; we know this is not restricted to one police force but is a national problem."
Katy Swaine Williams, Lead on CWJ’s Criminalisation Project, added:
“Through our criminalisation project, based on evidence from survivors, we have been calling for changes in law, policy and practice to prevent the unjust criminalisation of domestic abuse victims. Some of the examples in Baird’s report echo cases we have come across through our own research, including those where domestic abuse perpetrators make counter-allegations to discredit and punish their victim, and where traumatised victims show frustration with poor police responses to their situation and find themselves punished by the police with a charge of malicious communication. In these cases, victims find themselves stigmatised and punished by the people who should be protecting them.
“Baird is right to call on Greater Manchester Police to remind its officers of their duty to protect all victims of gender-based violence, to ensure they understand the law on arrest, to provide properly for women’s needs in custody, and to ensure contextual information about abuse and exploitation is properly taken into account in any case involving allegations against a victim. She also rightly highlights the need for police training on trauma, to ensure they respond appropriately to traumatised victims instead of criminalising them. The lessons from this report should be applied not only in Manchester but in police forces throughout the country.
“These events have coincided with a collapse in domestic abuse prosecutions and – unsurprisingly - increasingly poor levels of trust by women and girls in the police, particularly among Black, minoritised and migrant women and girls.
“Victims also need effective defences when they are accused of offences arising out of their experience of domestic abuse. When acting in self-defence against their abuser, they should have the same statutory protection as householders defending themselves against an intruder. When compelled to offend as a part of, or as a direct result of their experience of abuse, they should have the same statutory protection as trafficking victims compelled to offend as a result of their exploitation. Legislation is needed to modernise the law and end the unjust criminalisation of victims of abuse.”
ENDS