After a serving officer raped and murdered a young woman, an independent assessment found Britain’s largest police department to be racist, sexist, and homophobic. The Tuesday study stated that the Metropolitan Police Service, with over 34,000 officers, must “transform itself” or suffer dissolution. The audit stated that it has failed to protect the public from police who abuse women, that organizational changes have put women and children at risk, and that female officers and personnel often suffer sexism. Racist cops and workers and “deep-seated homophobia” were uncovered.
She called Baroness Louise Casey’s review “rigorous, stern and unsparing” after Sarah Everard’s murder. Sir Mark Rowley, Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said he accepted the “diagnosis” of discrimination in the police but would not use institutional because it is politicized and imprecise. Baroness Casey was upset that he would not accept the term, but she would wait to see what the force does in the following weeks and months. After Stephen Lawrence’s murder and the Met’s abysmal investigation, the 1999 Macpherson Inquiry found the force to be institutionally racist. In April 1993, a group of white adolescents in southeast London stabbed Lawrence, 18, to death. Five individuals were first acquitted after a botched police inquiry led to Macpherson. The assessment showed that the force has remained white and male since then. The Met was accused of homophobia for failing to stop serial murderer Stephen Port after he killed his first victim and three more men, but force leaders denied it.
‘Lost trust in policing’ After the study, victims’ relatives have asked for a public probe against the force. As citizens, we are not responsible for police safety. The review’s leader, Casey, a victim’s rights and social welfare specialist, stated, “The cops keep us secure.” “Too many Londoners now distrust cops to do that. The 363-page report also stated that women and girls’ violence has been ignored. A percent of Met employees with protected characteristics, such as ethnicity, sexuality, or handicap, are bullied. The study noted female cops and personnel encounter discrimination and misogyny.
“The Met has not safeguarded its female workers or the public from police domestic abusers or sexual abusers. “Despite the Met claiming violence against women and girls is a priority, it has been treated differently from ‘serious violence’. In reality, this has meant less resources and prioritization. The audit found “systemic and fundamental issues in how the Met is administered” and “inadequate management” rather than size. To “create a fundamentally better new London Metropolitan Police Service,” the study provided 16 suggestions for the Met, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, and the Home Office.
