Investigation into an allegation of sexual assault – Cambridgeshire Constabulary, May 2019

A woman reported a matter to Cambridgeshire Constabulary. She spoke to police officers about the matter and during the conversation she disclosed an incident that had taken place in November 2019 with a police officer.

She said she had met a man on a dating site who was a police officer. They exchanged phone numbers and began communicating, arranging to meet at the woman’s home. The man arrived at the woman’s home in uniform despite the fact he was off duty.

The woman invited the police officer inside her home. The officer immediately tried to kiss the woman and engage in a role play situation. He used his police handcuffs to restrain the woman’s hands behind her back and continued to kiss and touch her. The woman said she repeatedly asked the officer to stop and complained her back hurt. The officer eventually removed the handcuffs and left shortly after.

The woman blocked the officer’s number, and after speaking to other officers about an unrelated matter, felt able to disclose what had happened. The officers raised the matter with their sergeant. The officer was arrested, and his work and personal mobile phones were seized. We took witness statements, including one from the woman.

We received a conduct referral from the force and decided to investigate the allegations made by the woman, specifically whether the officer sexually assaulted her and whether he abused his position as a police officer for a sexual purpose.

The officer was interviewed under criminal caution by the Professional Standards Department in May 2020 and again by us under criminal caution in September 2020.

We concluded that the officer had behaved in a manner to justify disciplinary proceedings. We found the officer abused his position as a police officer by using his role, uniform and handcuffs to impress the woman, gain her trust and facilitate the sexual assault she alleged. The officer used force in his police uniform and with police handcuffs that was not part of his role and responsibilities, behaving in a manner that could discredit the police service.  

We found that the officer had a case to answer for gross misconduct. We shared our report with the force, who agreed. We decided that disciplinary proceedings should be brought against the officer and that they should take the form of a gross misconduct hearing.

The officer resigned before the hearing could take place, but he would have been dismissed without notice had he still been a serving police officer. He was placed on the College of Policing’s barred list.

We also referred the case to the Crown Prosecution Service, who decided to press charges for sexual assault. However, the case was discontinued because it no longer met the thresholds for prosecution.

We carefully considered whether there were any learning opportunities arising from the investigation. We make learning recommendations to improve policing and public confidence in the police complaints system and prevent a recurrence of similar incidents.

We did not identify any organisational learning in this case.