Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Emma ‘failed’ by cops, says mum, as killer gets life
THE family of Emma Caldwell have said police failed their daughter and the rape victims of her killer Iain Packer due to a “toxic culture of misogyny and corruption”.
In a statement after he was convicted of murdering the 27-year-old in 2005, her family said: “Instead of receiving justice and compassion, they (the victims) were humiliated, dismissed and in some instances arrested, while the police gifted freedom to an evil predator to rape and rape again.”
Packer, 51, was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 36 years after being found guilty yesterday.
She went missing in Glasgow on April 4 2005 and her body was found in Limefield Woods, near Roberton, South Lanarkshire, the following month.
Packer – who was first interviewed by the police a month after her body was found – was also convicted of 11 charges of rape against nine women and 21 other offences over a period of 26 years, following a six-week trial at the High Court in Glasgow.
Police Scotland has apologised to the family of Miss Caldwell and his other victims, admitting they were “let down” by policing.
But speaking outside court following the sentencing, the Caldwell family’s lawyer, Aamer Anwar, said her mother Margaret
believes police officers have “blood on their hands”.
The family have called for a public inquiry into failures by the authorities.
Mr Anwar said: “We now know Packer carried out rapes, sexual offences and assaults some 19 times after Emma’s murder in 2005. Margaret believes that officers sabotaged an investigation into Packer for a decade and have blood on their hands. For far too long they have remained in the shadows, but must now answer for their betrayal.
“Today Margaret Caldwell calls on the Scottish Government to
order an independent, judge-led public inquiry into what went wrong.
“The scale of the crimes and the failures are so catastrophic that nothing less than a judicial public inquiry will suffice. Neither the police nor Crown Office can be allowed or trusted to investigate themselves and their former bosses.
“If there is no time limit on justice, then any officers, retired or not, suspected of criminality must be prosecuted and those in our criminal justice system who gave Packer his freedom should finally be held to account.”