David Carrick, who joined the Met in 2001. Photograph: Family handout
Mon 16 January 2023:
Over an 18-year period, a serving officer in London’s Metropolitan Police admitted to 49 offenses, including 24 counts of rape, reigniting calls for urgent reform in the United Kingdom’s largest police force.
David Carrick appeared in Southwark Crown Court in London on Monday to plead guilty to four counts of rape, false imprisonment, and indecent assault against a 40-year-old woman in 2003, according to the UK’s PA Media news agency.
At the Old Bailey criminal court in London last month, Carrick admitted to 43 charges against 11 other women, including 20 counts of rape, between March 2004 and September 2020, according to PA.
David Carrick admitted 24 counts of rape.
A series of recent scandals have revealed what the UK police watchdog has described as a culture of misogyny and racism in London’s police force.
The UK’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said Carrick’s case is one of the “most shocking” it has ever seen.
“The scale of the degradation Carrick subjected his victims to is unlike anything I have encountered in my 34 years with the Crown Prosecution Service,” CPS Chief Crown Jaswant Narwal said.
“This is a man who relentlessly degraded, belittled and sexually assaulted and raped women.
“As time went on, the severity of his offending intensified as he became emboldened, thinking he would get away with it.”
Carrick, who served with the Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection Command, met some victims through online dating sites such as Tinder and Badoo, and used his role as a police officer to gain their trust.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said he is “absolutely sickened by the truly abhorrent offences” that Carrick committed.
“Londoners will be rightly shocked that this man was able to work for the Met for so long and serious questions must be answered about how he was able to abuse his position as an officer in this horrendous manner,” Khan tweeted Monday.
I am absolutely sickened by the truly abhorrent offences that David Carrick has committed.
Serious questions must be answered about how he was able to abuse his position as an officer.
My full statement: pic.twitter.com/ivELBXLpL9
— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) January 16, 2023
For the kidnapping, rape, and murder of Sarah Everard in September 2021, Metropolitan Police officer Wayne Couzens received a life sentence without the possibility of parole. This crime appalled the country and generated discussion about violence against women.
The prime minister’s official spokesman said it was “an appalling case” and that Rishi Sunak’s “thoughts are with all of [Carrick’s] victims”.
“There is no place in our police forces for officers who fall so seriously short of the acceptable standards of behaviour and are not fit to wear the uniform.”
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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