Barred, ex-cop who lied about botched flashing inquiry
A FORMER officer who botched an inquiry into Wayne Couzens hours before he killed Sarah Everard was barred from policing yesterday for lying about her failures.
Samantha Lee carried out a ‘sloppy’ investigation after the Scotland Yard officer flashed two women at a McDonald’s drive-through days before he abducted, raped and murdered the 33-year-old marketing executive.
Lee, 29, failed to make ‘the correct investigative inquiries’ and seek CCTV evidence of Couzens’ crimes.
The former officer, who has since left the force to set up an account on the platform OnlyFans under the name Officer Naughty, was yesterday found guilty of gross misconduct.
Chairman of the police disciplinary panel Darren Snow said Lee feared she could be blamed for failing to prevent the murder so she lied about CCTV, saying there was no footage of Couzens at the McDonald’s drive-through. He said: ‘Our conclusion is that the pressure bearing down on Ms Lee [led] to her lying in her initial meeting with officers as she was under stress and in a state of panic that left her feeling compelled to lie...
‘We have some understanding in this situation. A relatively straightforward exposure allegation became an issue of immense pressure. What may be seen as an unfair inference of the failures was in some way a failure to prevent the murder of Sarah Everard.’
The panel concluded that she failed to carry out proper inquiries at 12pm on March 3, 2021, when she visited the restaurant, but even if she had done her job properly there would not have been grounds to arrest Couzens immediately.
Just hours later the Met firearms officer went on the prowl for a victim, abducting Miss Everard in Clapham at 9pm.
Yesterday Lee was barred, and found guilty of breaching the standards of professional behaviour expected of an officer in relation to her duties and responsibilities, and her honesty and integrity.
Following the hearing, Lee said: ‘I feel like I have been a scapegoat. I’m a young female PC and I’m the only person who’s faced any disciplinary action in relation to this. There’s only one person who’s responsible for everything that happened and that is Wayne Couzens.
‘I have never lied. I don’t think it has been a fair investigation from the start.’
In an unrelated investigation, two probationary constables have been issued final written warnings following the sharing of an inappropriate graphic joking about Ms Everard’s murder.