London police chided again for corruption, crime links
Police officers stand guard at New Scotland Yard during a protest, following the kidnap and murder of Sarah Everard, in London, Britain, on March 15, 2021.
PHOTO: Reuters
PUBLISHED ONMarch 23, 2022 7:35 AM
LONDON - London police received yet another rebuke on Tuesday (March 23) for internal corruption and links to crime in a damning report born out of their flawed investigation of a 1987 murder.
The police inspectorate, an independent supervisory body, said Britain's largest police service, with 43,000 staff for the capital of eight million people, had hired people with criminal connections including more than 100 former offenders.
"Dire" procedures for handling property had left hundreds of items including cash and drugs unaccounted for, it added. In one instance, a security code for a store was written on the door.
"It is clear that the current arrangements are not fit for purpose," the inspectorate's head Matt Parr said.
The report will fuel widespread disgust with the Metropolitan Police after last year's rape and murder of a woman, Sarah Everard, by one of its officers, and revelations of bullying, racism and misogyny.
'Indifference'
Met chief Cressida Dick quit last month after London's mayor lost confidence in her to clean up the force.
The corruption inspection was commissioned last year after an inquiry found police had meddled with investigations into the 1987 killing of private investigator Daniel Morgan behind a pub with an axe in his head. Noone has been convicted.
Tuesday's report said decades later, current practices remained poor. "The Met's apparent tolerance of these shortcomings suggests a degree of indifference to the risk of corruption," added Parr.
In response, London's police service said it was deeply concerned at the criticisms and was reviewing its processes.
Though the police inspectorate acknowledged the Met's capability to investigate the most serious corruption allegations as impressive, it listed multiple more failings.
More than 2,000 ID cards were unaccounted for after their holders had left the police, it said, and the Met did not know whether those in sensitive posts such as child protection had been cleared to the necessary level of security vetting.