Police Prevented from Investigating Police

Police Prevented from Investigating Police

by TIM HICKS

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Following a series of scandals involving Police misconduct, many of them covered by the NYE, public confidence in the Police is at an all time low. It has recently been announced that the National Crime Agency (NCA) is to investigate allegations that Police Officers from South Yorkshire Police (SYP) sexually abused children who were victims of a grooming gang in Rotherham. Prior to this announcement SYP was investigating its own Officers.

According to reports in the media, the allegations being investigated are that five women who were victims of a grooming gang while they were children, were also abused by Police Officers from SYP. The investigation has led to the arrest of three former SYP Officers in December 2024.

The NYE has not performed an investigation into the Rotherham grooming gangs scandal, because it is out of area and too big for us to handle. So we refer to the comments of specialist solicitors David Greenwood and Amy Clowrey, who lead on grooming gang cases nationally, for solicitors Switalski’s:

“Switalskis has been representing survivors of abuse in Rotherham for over a decade. We were hopeful that following the criminal trials, and Operation Linden (run by the IOPC), that the alleged abuse by police officers would be unearthed and that there would be accountability. That never came. For years the authorities have resisted our requests for an investigation into the alleged criminality of police officers, despite us providing them with the accounts of survivors.

Those that have suffered abuse in Rotherham have no faith that SYP will do a thorough job of investigating alleged abuse by their own officers. In addition, dealing with SYP is retraumatising for them, many of our clients refuse to report offences to SYP because they do not think they will be believed and because they were treated so badly in the past. This investigation must be handed over to an independent police force to ensure that survivors feel confident enough to come forward.

The accounts we have heard, which we expect are only a fraction of the full scale of abuse, are utterly harrowing.

It is also important to note that the issues faced in South Yorkshire are not isolated and this should be a further wakeup call to the government to fully acknowledge the scale of child sexual abuse and institutional failings. The government must fulfil the recommendations within the final report of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and the more recent recommendations of Baroness Casey.”

Full comment by Switalski’s can be read here.

These are very serious allegations. Following the convictions of PC Wayne Couzens for the murder of Sarah Everard and of serial rapist PC David Carrick, if proven, they will further damage public confidence in the Police. So it is essential that any investigation is impartial. In an ideal world, an investigation by the so-called Independent Office of Police Conduct (IOPC), which is the new name of the former Independent Police Complaints Commission IPCC) would suffice. However as the statement by Switalskis above makes clear the IOPC has been ineffective in investigating these allegations.

The IOPC was 40% staffed by former Police Officers and had a reputation for “a pattern of favouritism towards the police, indifference and rudeness towards complainants, and complaints being rejected in spite of apparently powerful evidence in their support.” The IOPC was replaced by the IOPC in 2018. However, this organization is still staffed by former Police Officers and former members of Police staff.

A 2022 report by the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee into the IOPC found that “There needs to be a change of culture in police forces. It should not be necessary to compel officers to cooperate with investigations. This culture change must be from top to bottom to ensure that complaints are handled quickly and openly, delivering punishment for misconduct where necessary and clearing officers who have not committed an offence.” Guardian article here.

The fact that the investigation into SYP is now to be held by the NCA, not the IOPC speaks volumes for the public perception of this successor organization to the IPCC.

The Implications for North Yorkshire

For many years, the NYE has investigated scandals involving the abuse of children involving officials including Police Officers, either actively committing crimes against children, or acquiescing to it by turning a blind eye. These scandals include, but are not limited to:

• The Peter Jaconelli and Jimmy Savile paedophile ring scandal.
• The Throxenby Hall abuse scandal.
• The Kirklevington Detention Centre scandal.

Despite all the fine sounding words, no one has ever been convicted of anything in relation to the industrial scale of the abuse that was perpetrated on children there.

This represents a catastrophic failure of the way complaints against the Police, Prison Officers and other officials are investigated.

The NYE has consistently lobbied for these investigations to be removed from the control of Police Officers, whether they work for a Police Force or are retired Police Officers working for the IOPC/IPCC. Now the investigation of SYP officers involvement in the Rotherham grooming gangs scandal has been removed from the control of both SYP and the IOPC. The NCA is to be used for this investigation, because it is perceived as being independent and impartial, and the Police and IOPC are not.

This decision vindicates the line taken by the NYE since 2012 that the Police must not be allowed to investigate the themselves, because of the risk that they will prioritise protecting the Force reputation and individual Officers, over victims and the public interest. The classic example is our exposure of the investigation by NYP Deputy Chief Constable Sue Cross, which exonerated NYP of any misconduct in its failure to arrest Peter Jaconelli and Jimmy Savile. Following an NYE investigation – with the BBC – it was forced to admit that it had enough evidence to arrest Savile and Jaconelli for multiple rapes.

The End of the IOPC

This decision should be a death knell for the IOPC. There is no point in maintaining an organization to perform impartial investigations into the Police, when the public perception of it is that it cannot perform impartial investigation, requiring this task to be performed by another organization, to maintain public confidence in the police.

The IOPC has lost public confidence. It needs to be replaced with an organization that does not employ any ex Police Officers and/or ex Police staff, to investigate their former colleagues.