Failures by police that let stalker drive his ex to suicide
BLUNDERING police missed scores of chances to intervene before an abusive stalker drove his former girlfriend to kill herself, a damning investigation found.
Officers ‘consistently failed’ to link up almost all 34 reports relating to former soldier Nicholas Allen, who persecuted his ex-partner with abusive voicemails, texts and Facebook messages.
Police officers and staff have been rebuked over the failures which meant that the scale of Allen’s hateful campaign was never grasped.
Allen, 49, was ‘obsessive and controlling’ during his relationship with Justene Reece, 46, and tried to contact her almost 3,500 times after they split up. He set up a fake Facebook profile and even offered a reward of £1,000 for sightings of her.
In July 2017 he was jailed for ten years for her manslaughter after the Crown Prosecution Service said he caused Miss Reece ‘significant psychiatric harm and directly contributed to her death’. It was believed to be the first time a stalker had been held liable for the suicide of their victim.
Yesterday, the Independent Office for Police Conduct said it looked at responses by Staffordshire Police to 34 incidents between September 2016 and February 2017 when she died.
Investigators found that officers failed to crossreference reported incidents which led ‘to them being treated in isolation, and a lost opportunity to recognise the scale of Mr Allen’s offending’.
It said the performance of a now-retired senior officer had been ‘unsatisfactory’. The officer had advised against arresting Allen after he breached a court order to stay away from his victim. Seven officers and a member of police staff have been told their performance had not met ‘expected standards’. This related to the way calls were handled.
Miss Reece, a Laura Ashley shop assistant, left a note saying she had ‘run out of fight’ after six months of harassment. Allen had previous convictions for offences against women. Deputy Chief Constable Nick Baker of Staffordshire Police apologised and acknowledged the report’s findings.