How Met botched its probe into depraved detective suspended on full pay for 7 years
AN inquiry into the conduct of a senior Scotland Yard detective was ‘ botched’ after he was reported by four victims of sex crimes who had slept with him, it has emerged.
Recently sacked Met Detective Inspector Warren Arter – exposed in a bombshell Mail investigation on Saturday – avoided tougher sanctions after mistakes were made.
The claims were made in a BBC investigation into cocaine- snorting Arter and other officers accused of sexually exploiting vulnerable women.
According to the findings, evidence has been deleted in bungled inquiries and out of 500 allegations of officers abusing their position to target vulnerable women, only 24 were charged.
Four women reported that Arter, lead officer in a rape investigation team in south- east London, had had sex with them. All had previously claimed to be victims of rape or sexual assault.
According to the BBC, two former members of the Met’s professional standards unit allege that ‘forensic best practice’ was not adhered to in the case, and the officer’s phone was wiped by someone remotely after his arrest.
Arter, 53, was suspended on full pay for
How did this senior detective keep his job on full pay for SEVEN years, as well as his pension?
seven years before finally being dismissed in May for gross misconduct.
While removed from duty, the officer, who was on £60,000 a year, continued taking cocaine, exchanged sordid messages with women and went to orgies where Class A drugs were taken in his presence.
His total earnings while suspended were about £400,000.
As revealed in Saturday’s Mail, Arter has avoided criminal charges and in due course will be able to claim a sizeable portion of his police pension after 27 years’ service.
Susan Hall, frontrunner to be the Conservatives’ candidate for London Mayor who would have oversight of the Met if she won next year’s election, lashed out at the latest revelations about the Arter case, which follows the jailing of two disgraced Met officers – Sarah Everard’s killer Wayne Couzens and serial rapist David Carrick.
She told the Mail: ‘We have got to root out this corrupt, predatory and criminal behaviour within the Met, and ensure the commissioner has the powers to sack toxic officers. It is a terrible injustice that vulnerable people fear the police, but criminals don’t.’
According to the BBC investigation, police forces across the country are failing vulnerable women who say they have been sexually exploited by officers.
Disturbing footage emerged yesterday showing a police officer lurking outside the home of a woman who says he subjected her to a two-year stalking ordeal.
Charlotte Smith, 28, claimed she was harassed by him following a relationship that lasted only a few months.
She first met the officer years previously when she was a young adult and known to police as a potential victim of grooming.
Other cases the BBC investigated involved women known to be rape and domestic abuse victims and an adult who was sexually assaulted as a child.
In another example, an officer has faced 20 separate allegations, while another who faced nine was handed only a final written warning.
The BBC said it received responses to information requests from 32 police forces in England, Wales and Scotland about allegations of ‘abuse of position for a sexual purpose’.
The claims cover the past five years, although some forces were only able to provide figures from 2020, when the complaint category was simplified.
The Independent Office of Police Conduct says it has oversight of the police complaints system but that the responsibility lies with forces themselves to root out any abuse of position it describes as ‘serious corruption’. The BBC did not name Arter in its report.