Detective who lied about sexual abuse investigation jailed
A fAMILY protection officer who failed to act on reports that a mother and daughter had suffered years of abuse has been jailed for eight months.
Detective constable Stuart Galloway, 43, lied to the women, saying their alleged abuser had been arrested and was going on trial.
The officer had them believe the man had admitted to serious sex crimes, sparing them the ordeal of giving evidence.
He then concocted stories about why sentencing kept being delayed, including that the man had been arrested in London for speeding.
Galloway was rumbled when the youngest alleged victim went to police asking for a crime reference number. The former officer from Kilmarnock, Ayrshire, pleaded guilty at Glasgow Sheriff court to wilfully neglecting and violating his duty last month.
Yesterday Sheriff John Mccormick jailed Galloway for eight months, telling him: ‘Public trust in police officers is essential. failure to investigate [ allegations of sexual assault] can have serious consequences for the alleged victims of crime.
‘Here there is not only a failure to investigate but a concerted attempt to explain delays and conceal any failure.’
The sheriff said it was the ‘tenacity’ of the victim that prevented the failure to investigate going unnoticed.
Galloway, who had 19 years’ service, resigned from Police Scotland in 2014.
His defence lawyer, Brian fitzpatrick, said in mitigation that Galloway’s actions had been the result of undiagnosed depression and anxiety disorders brought on by the stress of his large caseload.
The court was previously told that in November 2009, a 41year- old woman – known as Witness A – told police she had been sexually and physically abused by her father between 1979 to 1989. She said in a statement that he had also raped her mother (Witness B).
In September 2010, the inquiry was allocated to Galloway, but he failed to detain the alleged abuser and instead spun the women a web of lies.
Procurator f i scal depute Andrew Beadsworth said: ‘Both witnesses feel let down and shattered by the accused’s actions, who violated the trust they placed in him.’
In 2013, Galloway told both women ‘the good news’ that the man had pleaded guilty and then fed them a series of excuses for why fictitious sentencing dates had been cancelled, including that the father had been beaten up in prison.
When ‘sentencing’ was cancelled yet again in April 2014, Witness A became suspicious and went to police.
After no case details were found, Galloway confessed to his superiors: ‘I messed up’.
An investigation then began into the alleged historic abuse and the man was eventually jailed for a year for domestic assault on Witness B.