Category Archives: Metropolitan police

Metropolitan police officer charged with rape

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PC David Carrick to appear in court on Monday over incident in Hertfordshire in September 2020

A serving Metropolitan police officer has been charged with rape, the Crown Prosecution Service has said.

PC David Carrick, 46, of Stevenage, Hertfordshire, will appear via video link at Hatfield magistrates court on Monday. Scotland Yard said Carrick, who is based within the Met’s parliamentary and diplomatic protection command, was charged with rape by Hertfordshire constabulary on Sunday.

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Everard murder case sparks urgent inquiry into vetting of police officers

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Those who report inappropriate behaviour in forces should be given more support, say senior officers

Police vetting procedures will be urgently reviewed as part of attempts to address the crisis engulfing policing after the murder of Sarah Everard.

Senior officers in charge of UK policing standards also revealed that they wanted to rebuild trust by better protecting officers who challenged “unacceptable behaviour” by colleagues.

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Met officers investigated over Couzens WhatsApp group are still on duty

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Exclusive: under-fire force places two police officers on restricted duties, while other forces suspend officers

Two Metropolitan police officers allegedly involved in a chat group that included Wayne Couzens that swapped alleged misogynistic and racist messages have been left on duty after being placed under criminal investigation, the Guardian has learned.

The two Met officers are said to have been part of a WhatsApp group involving constables from three forces that is under investigation after Couzens’s phone was seized following his arrest for the murder of Sarah Everard in March.

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Sarah Everard case: people stopped by lone officer could ‘wave down a bus’, says Met

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Minister speaks of ‘devastating blow’ as Scotland Yard suggests actions to take if feeling unsafe

Police will have to work hard to rebuild public confidence after the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving officer, a minister has said, as Scotland Yard said people stopped by a lone plainclothes officer should challenge their legitimacy and could try “waving a bus down” to escape a person they believe is pretending to be police.

Wayne Couzens, who joined the Metropolitan police in 2018, was handed a rare whole-life sentence on Thursday for the kidnap, rape and murder of 33-year-old Everard as she walked home in south London in March.

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Sarah Everard’s killer might have been identified as threat sooner, police admit

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Details of indecent exposure claims emerge as ex-Met officer Wayne Couzens is given whole-life sentence

Police have accepted they may have had enough clues to identify Wayne Couzens as a threat to women before he raped and killed Sarah Everard..

Couzens was handed a rare whole-life sentence on Thursday, meaning he will spend the rest of his life in jail. The judge said his crimes were as serious as a terrorist atrocity because he abused his powers as a police officer to commit them.

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Sarah Everard: Wayne Couzens to be sentenced for kidnap, rape and murder

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Met officer used police ID card and handcuffs to lure Everard into car before killing her and burning body

The former Metropolitan police officer Wayne Couzens is to be sentenced for the kidnap, rape and murder of Sarah Everard, amid calls for a formal law to set out the rights of victims.

Couzens, 48, used his police warrant card and handcuffs to lure Everard off the street before strangling her with his police belt and burning her body, depriving her family of the chance to say a final goodbye, a court heard.

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Charles has ‘no knowledge’ of alleged offer of honours, says

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Clarence House says Prince of Wales supports investigation after he and trusted aide reported to police

The Prince of Wales has “no knowledge” of the alleged honours and citizenship controversy, Clarence House has said, after Charles and his most trusted aide were reported to the police over the claims.

At least two complaints have been made to the Metropolitan police over allegations that a wealthy Saudi businessman was offered help to secure an honour and British citizenship after donating to Charles’s charities.

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‘Imminent’ decision on future of Cressida Dick as Met commissioner

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Priti Patel and Dick discussed the commissioner’s future last week, it is understood

Ministers and the Metropolitan police commissioner, Cressida Dick, have begun discussions about whether her turbulent term in charge of Britain’s biggest force will be extended, with a decision said to be “imminent”.

Dick, the first woman in charge of the London force since it was established in 1829, is on a five-year contract that expires in April 2022. She could step down then or have the contract extended for a period.

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Wrong to label Extinction Rebellion as extremists, says Home Office adviser

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Peer at odds with Priti Patel over climate activists on eve of more protests

A government extremism adviser has admitted during a private meeting that it is wrong to label Extinction Rebellion (XR) supporters as “extreme”, despite the home secretary, Priti Patel, condemning the group as “criminals” who threaten the nation’s way of life.

John Woodcock, the former Labour MP who was asked by the Home Office this year to examine disruption and violence by extreme political groups, sought to reassure XR activists that he did not regard the movement as uniformly extreme during a Zoom video conference call last month. “You’re worried that I want to label everyone who supports XR as extremists and that is certainly not the case,” he said.

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Revealed: Met police trainees’ violence and dishonesty

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Cressida Dick backs Hendon methods, despite leaked documents and internal sources revealing alarming incidents and poor applicants

The head of the Metropolitan police, Cressida Dick, has been forced to defend recruitment standards as leaked documents reveal cases of violent disorder, cheating and dishonesty among trainees at Britain’s biggest police force.

The incidents relate to recruits at the Met’s main training centre and will raise concerns about its ability to provide an effective service as sources within the force allege declining standards for trainees as recruitment has been ramped up.

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‘Excited delirium’: term linked to police restraint in UK medical guide condemned

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Public health bodies and families say term carries racial bias and is used to justify lethal use of force by police

Public health bodies, charities and the families of men who died after being restrained by police have condemned the inclusion of a controversial medical term in one of the UK’s leading medical handbooks.

Acute behavioural disturbance (ABD), more commonly known as “excited delirium”, a contentious expression used in fatal cases of police violence, has recently been added to the Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines (MPG).

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Man filmed accosting Chris Whitty loses job as estate agent

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Lewis Hughes, 24, apologises for ‘any upset caused’ after video of incident in London went viral

A man who was called a “thug” by Boris Johnson after being filmed accosting Prof Chris Whitty has apologised for “any upset I caused”.

Lewis Hughes, 24, said if he made England’s chief medical officer feel “uncomfortable”, then “I am sorry to him for that”. He said he had lost his job as a result of the video.

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UN calls for end of ‘impunity’ for police violence against black people

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Report launched in aftermath of George Floyd murder cites example of 2018 death of Kevin Clarke in UK

A UN report that analysed racial justice in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd has called on member states including the UK to end the “impunity” enjoyed by police officers who violate the human rights of black people.

The UN human rights office analysis of 190 deaths across the world led to the report’s damning conclusion that law enforcement officers are rarely held accountable for killing black people due in part to deficient investigations and an unwillingness to acknowledge the impact of structural racism.

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Met police brace for ‘busy weekend’ of major London protests

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Dance music acts along with anti-lockdown, anti-austerity and climate activists will all converge on capital

Some of the UK’s leading dance music acts are expected to join a protest march in London calling for the government to scrap Covid restrictions on nightclubs, as the capital gears up for a weekend of mass demonstrations.

Anti-lockdown protesters, anti-austerity campaigners and environmentalists will also stage protests in London on Saturday and Sunday, and the Metropolitan police said they were preparing for “a busy weekend”.

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Police interviewed Prince Charles over ‘plot to kill Diana’

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Former Met chief reveals he questioned prince as a witness in 2005 about note written by princess

The former Metropolitan police chief John Stevens has disclosed that he questioned Prince Charles over allegations that he had plotted to kill Diana, Princess of Wales.

Charles was interviewed as a witness in 2005, during a three-year investigation into Diana’s death in a Paris car crash in 1997, the Daily Mail reported.

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US journalist Barrett Brown arrested in the UK on incitement offences

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He had been in Britain since November and intended to claim asylum on the basis that he had been persecuted in the US for his journalism

The American journalist Barrett Brown has been arrested and detained in the UK for allegedly overstaying his visa and for alleged public order and incitement offences relating to his role in holding a protest banner which said: “Kill Cops.”

Police arrested Brown on Monday at a canal boat moored in east London, where he had been living for several months with a British woman. He was interviewed and released on bail the following day, but immediately detained by immigration authorities.

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Police hunt man who tried to frame person for Westminster terror attack

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Gerald Banyard found guilty of perverting course of justice over attack by Khalid Masood in 2017

A police hunt is under way for a man who “looked to exploit an extremely tragic and serious situation” by framing an innocent person for the Westminster terror attack.

Gerald Banyard, 67, of Whalley, Lancashire, sent two handwritten notes to police in the days after the Westminster Bridge attack by Khalid Masood in March 2017, claiming that his landlord’s partner had been involved in the atrocity, in which five people were killed including PC Keith Palmer.

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Fourth officer allegedly fathered child after meeting woman undercover

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Officer used alias Alan Bond while infiltrating the Socialist Workers party between 1981 and 1986, inquiry hears

A fourth undercover officer who spied on political campaigners is alleged to have fathered a child with a woman he met while using a fake identity, a public inquiry has heard.

The officer used the alias Alan Bond while infiltrating the Socialist Workers party between 1981 and 1986.

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Met dismisses police officer who belonged to banned neo-Nazi terror group

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Hearing finds Ben Hannam’s actions ‘harmed public confidence in, and the reputation of’ force

A man who became the first British police officer convicted of belonging to a neo-Nazi terrorist organisation has been dismissed from the Metropolitan police without notice.

Ben Hannam was found guilty on 1 April of membership of the banned rightwing extremist group National Action (NA) following a trial at the Old Bailey.

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