David Carrick not suspended despite rape claim after Everard murder
Met Police chief says it is ‘indefensible’ that serial rapist cop David Carrick was allowed to carry on working AFTER allegations were made against him in wake of Sarah Everard murder – but admits he can’t promise there aren’t more like him still on force
- An ex of rapist Met cop David Carrick says he saw himself as being ‘untouchable’
- Sir Mark Rowley has apologised to the victims of the 20-year veteran of the force
- The 48-year-old pleaded guilty to sex attacks on 12 women over nearly 20 years
- Met Commissioner says officers failed to investigate Carrick as they should have
- It emerged over 1,000 Met officers and staff are being probed for abuse claims
Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley today admitted it was ‘not defensible’ that PC David Carrick remained in work when he was accused of rape – even after a fellow diplomatic protection officer abused and murdered Sarah Everard.
Sir Mark today drew parallels between the cases and said that the inquiry by Dame Elish Angiolini into whether any red flags were missed in Wayne Couzens’ policing career should now be expanded to look into Carrick.
Sir Mark’s admission came hours before David Carrick, 48, was sacked by the Metropolitan Police at a misconduct hearing held in his absence in west London.
Carrick, now revealed as one of Britain’s worst rapists, abused that elite position to coerce terrified victims in a depraved campaign of sexual abuse, bragging that he was ‘untouchable’. Carrick has now admitted 49 charges against a dozen women, including 24 counts of rape, stretching from 2003 to 2020. On several occasions he waved his warrant card to gain their trust and even used his used his gun and handcuffs in attacks.
Sir Mark said today that it is ‘not defensible’ that Carrick’s record had not been checked in the wake of the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving cop.
The force is now reviewing around 1,000 members of staff and officers who have previously been accused of domestic abuse or sexual violence. Sir Mark today predicted that mistakes will have been made in those cases and that ‘hundreds’ of bad apples would be forced to leave the Met.
He also admitted he could not promise that a woman visiting a police station to report a sexual offence would not be met by a police officer whose past behaviour is now under review.
Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley said the sustained employment of Pc David Carrick was a “spectacular failure” in his force. He said it is “not defensible” that Carrick’s record had not been checked in the wake of the murder of Sarah Everard, before he became Commissioner.
Dame Cressida Dick refused to resign over the Couzens scandal and vowed to do all she could to protect women and girls from harm. But it has emerged that Carrick was not suspended from work despite being accused of rape
– March 3 2021: Wayne Couzens abducts, rapes and murders Sarah Everard
– March 15 2021: Dame Cressida Dick vows to root out bad apples and protect women. She said: ‘What happened to Sarah appalls me [and] makes me more determined, not less, to lead my organisation’
– July 9 2021: Couzens admits his crimes. Dame Cressida Dick, the Met’s chief, said the entire force was ‘sickened, angered and devastated’ by Couzens’ ‘truly dreadful crimes’. ‘Everyone in policing feels betrayed’, she said.
– July 2021: The woman reports being raped by Carrick. He is arrested by Hertfordshire Police over the allegation but no further action is taken after she withdraws the complaint.
The Met’s Directorate of Professional Standards is made aware and Carrick is placed on restricted duties. It is determined he has no case to answer in relation to any misconduct and in September the restriction is lifted, although he never returns to full duties.
September 30, 2021: Couzens was sentenced to life imprisonment with a tariff of a whole life order
– October 1 2021: A 50-year-old woman reports she was raped by Carrick in September 2020. He is arrested, charged and suspended by the Met.
– October 4: Carrick is remanded in custody after appearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court charged with rape.
– October 2021-October 2022: The publicity prompts another 12 women to come forward and make allegations against Carrick.
– December 16 2022: Carrick pleads guilty to 43 offences at the Old Bailey. His pay is stopped by the Met.
– January 16 2023: Carrick admits a further six charges at Southwark Crown Court.
Sarah was abducted by Couzens on March 3 2021 after he used has warrant card to stop her claiming he was enforcing lockdown laws before driving her to Kent to abuse and strangle her to death.
In the new chilling case that shames the Met, it emerged that Carrick also showed at least two victims his warrant card, telling them on dates: ‘I’m a police officer, you’re safe with me’.
Carrick was arrested by Hertfordshire Police in July 2021 after a woman reported being raped by him after walking into a police station just 24 hours after Couzens had pleaded guilty.
The Met was made aware of the claim their officer was an abuser – not for the first time – but Carrick was not suspended and placed on restricted duties instead.
Then Commissioner Cressida Dick was at the Old Bailey to meet her family to apologise after Couzens pleaded guilty, declaring: ‘All of us in the Met are sickened, angered and devastated by this man’s truly dreadful crimes. Everyone in policing feels betrayed’.
Another woman who accused Carrick of rape later told detectives she had seen the details of Sarah Everard in the press and said it was right to report her case knowing Carrick to be a police officer.
In late September 2021, when Couzens was jailed for life with no parole, Dame Cressida said that an additional 650 officers will be placed across the capital in the wake of Sarah Everard’s murder to keep women and girls safe.
On October 1, a 50-year-old woman reported she was raped by Carrick in September 2020. He is arrested, charged and suspended by the Met. On October 4: Carrick is remanded in custody after appearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court charged with rape.
Sir Mark Rowley today said the sustained employment of Pc David Carrick was a ‘spectacular failure’ in his force.
Asked to explain, he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘This is about weak decision-making in professional standards, not joining the dots between related incidents, and poor policies, and that all comes together to mean he was a police officer for 20 years and for a large part of this he was a predatory rapist.’
Sir Mark agreed it was a ‘spectacular failure’ by his force.
He said: ‘You can’t say anything else – it absolutely is.
‘I have been crystal clear from coming into post … that one of the top planks of my responsibilities is to rebuild our integrity, and part of that is to take on those who corrupt our integrity – people like David Carrick and, frankly, many others.
‘We have been too weak on this, systematically, for some time.’
Former victims’ commissioner Vera Baird said the case of serial rapist Pc David Carrick ‘absolutely takes one’s breath away’.
She told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘The Metropolitan Police seem incapable of not employing – and furthermore retaining – some quite evil people.
‘He appears to have been reassessed since the murder of Sarah Everard, since the Charing Cross misogyny scandal came out.
‘Where exactly is the change in culture that we have all been told would occur after that catastrophic death now a couple of years ago?’
She added that it was not the Met that exposed Carrick but one of the victims who ‘had the courage’ to go to another police force.
Sir Mark Rowley yesterday issued a grovelling apology on Monday as the true extent of the 48-year-old’s horrific crimes became public knowledge for the first time, admitting that the force ‘let women and girls down’.
And it was revealed that the force, which missed multiple signs about his true nature for years while he worked as a parliamentary and diplomatic protection officer, is now looking into abuse claims against more than 1,000 members of staff.
Carrick, pictured here in his police uniform, demeaned his victims, telling one woman ‘you’re my slave’
According to one woman who claims she was in a one-off relationship with the sadistic officer for five years, the rapist had bragged that his position meant he couldn’t be prosecuted.
A review into how Wayne Couzens was able to serve in the Met and the red flags missed should now take in David Carrick, Sir Mark Rowley said
Speaking to the Sun the woman, who only gives her first name as Rachel, said Carrick seemed to know about an assault she had reported to the police, suggesting he had used the force’s database to look up her personal information.
She added that he had claimed to take items, including jewellery, from the Met’s evidence lockers to use them at home.
She told the paper: ‘I once asked him if he was not worried about getting caught because of his job. His exact words to me were ‘it’s because of my job that I’m not worried’.
‘He said he was so far at the top that he was untouchable.’
The woman said that while she was not assaulted by Carrick when she was with him, he treated her in a degrading and demeaning way.
She said he told her to ‘behave like a prostitute’ and had asked her to pretend to be asleep in the bedroom.
She added that he had used police-issue handcuffs on her and brought what looked to be a real gun home with him, along with his police baton.
Horrific crimes of Met cop David Carrick who inflicted 71 sex attacks on 12 women who he called his ‘slaves’, controlled what they ate and cut them off from their families – as he is revealed as one of UK’s worst rapists
Rachel said his behaviour was controlling, saying: ‘Knowing now what he has done and how he treated all of those women, how on earth was he allowed to be a police officer?’
It was revealed on Monday that Carrick abused his elite position to to coerce terrified victims in a depraved campaign of sexual abuse. Carrick has admitted charges against a dozen women, including dozens of counts of rape, stretching from 2003 to 2020.
The Met said it was now reviewing 1,633 cases involving 1,071 of its officers and staff who have faced complaints of domestic abuse or sexual offending over the past decade.
It comes as one female former chief constable warned that vetting in the police is ‘non-existent’.
Sue Fish, the former head of Nottinghamshire Police, said the system is ‘utterly unfit for purpose’ and that it ‘fails to recognise predatory men within policing ranks or aspiring to-be members of the police service’.
She told the Telegraph: ‘I am rarely speechless, but this is worse than horrific. I think the scary question is: how many others are there?’
She added that the disciplinary process within forces sees things ‘in isolation’ and does not see patterns of behaviour that could raise red flags.
When Carrick was first arrested for rape in July 2021, he was placed on restricted duties rather than being suspended. And bosses failed to carry out basic checks into his background that would have revealed a pattern of abusive behaviour.
Carrick was vetted just twice during his two decades in the force, in 2001 and 2017, despite rules stating officers in his position should be reviewed every ten years.
He was known among colleagues as ‘Bastard Dave’ and had a reputation for being ‘mean and cruel’. But over two decades, no colleagues expressed concerns.
Carrick, pictured here at the beach, abused and tortured women at his Hertfordshire home
Carrrick, pictured here in an artists impression in court, boasted to women that he was a police officer
His mother Jean last night said a serious complaint was first made about her son when he was just a teenager.
Carrick yesterday entered guilty pleas to six counts of rape and sexual assault against one woman, having admitted 43 offences against 11 women at the Old Bailey last month. Some of the pleas cover multiple offences, meaning he has confessed to more than 80 serious sex crimes.
The cases relating to other Met officers that are being reviewed include those that resulted in no action or no criminal allegations. Sir Mark, who replaced Dame Cressida Dick in September following her resignation amid a string of scandals, said he would write to Home Secretary Suella Braverman and London Mayor Sadiq Khan in March with the review’s findings.
Mother of rapist Met cop David Carrick claims she reported him when he was a teenager over ‘serious allegation’ – as ex-friend claims he was ‘power freak’ who used to flash his warrant card to intimidate people
The force has been rocked by the murder of Sarah Everard, by a damning report revealing a toxic culture at Charing Cross police station and by a pair of officers who photographed the bodies of two murdered sisters.
The Met will check potentially dangerous officers against police and national intelligence databases, Sir Mark said. He added in a statement: ‘This man abused women in the most disgusting manner. It is sickening.
‘We’ve let women and girls down and indeed we’ve let Londoners down. The women who suffered and survived this violence have been unimaginably brave.
‘And I do understand also that this will lead to some women across London questioning whether they can trust the Met to keep them safe. We have failed. And I’m sorry. He should not have been a police officer.’
Women’s groups last night said the Met was ‘an institution in crisis’.
Andrea Simon, of the End Violence Against Women coalition, said: ‘It is abundantly clear that an officer whose behaviour gave him the nickname ‘Dave the Bastard’ among colleagues should not have been in the force in the first place.’
Sir Mark has repeatedly said it is ‘crazy’ that he is unable to sack officers when they break the law.
Carrick was first charged with raping a 50-year-old woman in October 2021. This charge was later dropped, but its coverage in the media gave 12 other women the courage to report abuse at his hands.
The officer’s abhorrent crimes included rape, dragging his victims into the shower by their hair before sexually assaulting them, keeping them locked in a small cupboard and carrying out sickening sexual acts against their will. An ex-girlfriend said Carrick would handcuff her wrist to her ankle with his police-issue cuffs, then claim he had left the key at the station in London.
Carrick, from Stevenage in Hertfordshire, joined the Met in August 2001, having served for two years in the Army.
The previous year, he was accused of burglary and malicious communications involving an ex-girlfriend but he was not arrested. He passed vetting checks the following year and began working as a response officer in Merton, south-west London.
While still on probation in 2002, Carrick was accused of harassment and assault of a former partner. Again, he was not arrested, and the matter was never referred to the Met’s Directorate of Professional Standards.
Carrick was involved in domestic incidents in 2004, 2009 and 2019, a harassment allegation in 2014, and an altercation at a nightclub in 2017 but no further action was taken. Then, in July 2021, Carrick was arrested over a rape complaint. He was not suspended, however, and the victim dropped the complaint. When Carrick was later charged over a separate woman, the first victim was recontacted and Carrick admitted raping her and carrying out a sickening sexual act.
He will be sentenced early next month and faces a long prison sentence.
Speaking today Sir Mark said the force had let ‘women and girls down’, admitting his officers had ‘failed’ to investigate allegations made against Carrick as they should have.
In a statement he said: ‘This man abused women in the most disgusting manner. It is sickening. We’ve let women and girls down and indeed we’ve let Londoners down.
‘The women who suffered and survived this violence have been unimaginably brave and courageous in coming forward.
‘And I do understand also that this will lead to some women across London questioning whether they can trust the Met to keep them safe.
‘We have failed. And I’m sorry. He should not have been a police officer.’
How did the Met fail to stop the sex monster within its ranks? Scotland Yard missed nine chances to catch rapist cop David Carrick as he attacked 12 women over 17 years – and failed to suspend him when he was arrested for rape
The Met commissioner, who started in the role several months ago, added: ‘We haven’t applied the same sense of ruthlessness to guarding our own integrity that we routinely apply to confronting criminals.
‘We failed in two respects.
‘We failed as investigators where we should have been more intrusive and joined the dots on this repeated misogyny over a couple of decades.
‘And as leaders, our mindset should have been more determined to root out such a misogynist.
‘These failures are horrific examples of the systemic failures that concern me and were highlighted by Baroness Casey in her recent review. I do know an apology doesn’t go far enough, but I do think it’s important to acknowledge our failings and for me to say I’m sorry.
‘I apologise to all of David Carrick’s victims. And I also want to say sorry to all of the women across London who feel we’ve let them down.
‘I have promised action. From my first day four months ago, I said that the Met will become ruthless at rooting out those who corrupt our integrity. That’s because our integrity is our foundation.
‘We haven’t guarded this as ferociously as we must and we will do. In the four months to date, we’ve launched a new anti-corruption and abuse command, putting 30 per cent more officers into fighting corruption. And we’ve done public appeals.
‘We’ve raised 250 fresh lines of inquiry, and we’re doing more proactive work against problematic officers than ever before. I’ve also brought in new leadership to lead this work, to reform our integrity.
‘At the end of March, I plan to write to the Home Secretary and the Mayor in an open public letter. And by then, we will also have finished reviewing all of our people, having checked their details against all the police, national intelligence data in the police national database.
‘We’ll have begun a full review of our national vetting process, we’ll have completed Operation Onyx, which is our review of the officers and staff whom we have concerning domestic or sexual incident reports against.
‘And we’ll also have tested new legal routes to dismiss those who fail vetting.
‘We will reform at speed. I promise that to Londoners.’
David Carrick, pictured here in his police uniform, pleaded guilty today to 71 sex attacks on 12 women over the course of nearly 20 years
Carrick, pictured, admitted to 48 counts of rape when he appeared at court on Monday, January 16
At court earlier today it was revealed Carrick, whose nickname on the force was ‘Ba***ard Dave’, abused and tortured 12 victims, boasting to them ‘I’m a police officer, you can trust me’.
He locked women in a cupboard under the stairs of his Hertfordshire home for hours on end, controlled what they ate and isolated them from their families.
The vile police officer allegedly whipped his victims with belts, dragged them by their hair and demeaned them by saying ‘you’re my slave, you’re my whore’.
The rapist had joined the force in 2001 despite allegations of malicious communications and burglary against an ex-partner just a year before.
While on his probationary period he was accused of assault and harassment against a former partner, but this was not passed onto the Directorate of Professional Standards.
‘I can kill you without leaving any evidence’: Victim reveals chilling threat of rapist Met cop David Carrick who she claims forced her to drink his urine, raped her and restrained her with police-issue handcuffs – as he admits 71 sex attacks on 12 women
Following this he used his position as a police officer to abuse women, finding some of his victims on dating websites and meeting them in bars where he would gain their trust.
He would appear to be a ‘fun-loving, charming and charismatic’ man, prosecutors said, but this was hiding a dark secret.
In reality, he was ‘very manipulative’ and ‘self-confident almost to the point of being cocky’.
When he was arrested at his Stevenage home in October 2021 accused of raping a woman he met on Tinder, he said: ‘Not again.’
When she arrived at a nearby pub on September 4, 2020, Carrick had ordered a bottle of wine and the woman said she felt ‘pressured’ to drink as he had paid for it.
He told her he was a Met Police firearms officer nicknamed ‘Ba***ard Dave’, showed her his warrant card and boasted of meeting famous people, including Mr Johnson, in the course of his work.
She told police that Carrick called her ‘disgusting’ and referred to himself as a ‘dominant bastard’ while raping her the following morning after she woke up naked in the bath with sick in her hair.
While looking into the allegations against him, investigators found a pattern of behaviour where Carrick abused his position as a police officer.
Carrick, who had a pet snake, exerted control by paying for dinner and drinks, so women would feel indebted to him before isolating them from their friends and family members.
He would tell some of his victims they were not allowed to eat, calling them ‘fat and lazy’, while others were ordered to stay in bed all day so they could have sex all night.
Women were locked in an understairs cupboard in Carrick’s home, said by police to be smaller than a dog crate, for hours without food, or made to clean the house naked.
Carrick urinated over some of his victims and made derogatory comments towards the women, referring to them as his ‘slave’ or a ‘whore’.
Senior Crown Prosecutor Shilpa Shah told a media briefing: ‘The patterns of behaviour that were similar would be things such as the derogatory comments, calling them things like his slave, and making rude remarks all the time.
‘This was also on the phone evidence – he would message them calling them horrid names, saying things such as you’re my slave, you’re a whore. In the actual offending behaviour there were striking similarities
‘For example, that he would urinate in their mouth. That is something that you wouldn’t make up. He would also force them to give him oral sex to the point that they would be gagging.
‘For a couple of the victims he would say they weren’t allowed to eat today, saying you could eat this much of an apple today. He would call them fat and lazy, and say that’s why you’re not allowed to eat.’
Explaining how Carrick allegedly financially abused his victims, Ms Shah said he would make them feeling indebted to him.
She said: ‘He would be the one to pay for them and would not allow them pay. It would be something along the lines of, you’re not using your own money, you use my money, so they would feel indebted to him.’
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