London police officer pleads guilty to dozens of rape charges over 18-year period

An officer in London’s Metropolitan Police pled guilty Monday to 49 offenses, including 24 charges of rape over an 18-year period. 

David Carrick pled guilty at Southwark Crown Court  to four counts of rape, false imprisonment, and indecent assault relating to a 40-year-old woman in 2003, according to the UK’s PA Media news agency, CNN reported. 

Last month, Carrick also pled guilty to 43 charges against 11 other women, including 20 counts of rape, between March 2004 and September 2020. 

Carrick isn’t the only Metropolitan Police officer to have committed such crimes. Wayne Couzens was sentenced to life in prison without parole in September 2021 for the abduction, rape and murder of Sarah Everard. 

Last year, Metropolitan Police Service Commissioner Cressida Dick resigned from her post after a review by the Independent Office for Police Conduct issued 15 recommendations “to change policing practice” in the country. 

Carrick’s case is one of the “most shocking” the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has ever seen. 

“The scale of the degradation Carrick subjected his victims to is unlike anything I have encountered in my 34 years with the Crown Prosecution Service,” CPS Chief Crown Prosecutor Jaswant Narwal said outside Southwark Crown Court on Monday. 

“I commend every single woman who courageously shared their traumatic experience and enabled us to bring this case to court and see justice served,” Narwal continued. 

Detective Chief Inspector Iain Moor, the senior investigating officer in the case, called Carrick’s crimes “truly shocking.” 

“The police service is committed to tackling violence against women and girls in all its forms,” Moor said. He added, “No one is above the law.” 

Assistant Commissioner for the Metropolitan Police Barbara Gray apologized on behalf of the police force to all the victims, saying Carrick “should have been dismissed from the police service a long time ago.” 

“We should have spotted his pattern of abusive behavior and because we didn’t, we missed opportunities to remove him from the organization,” Gray added. “We are truly sorry that Carrick was able to continue to use his role as a police officer to prolong the suffering of his victims.” 

“The duration and nature of Carrick’s offending is unprecedented in policing. But regrettably he is not the only Met officer to have been charged with serious sexual offenses in the recent past,” she continued. 

The Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said in a statement on Twitter, “Londoners will be rightly shocked that this man was able to work for the Met for so long, and serious questions must be answered about how he was able to abuse his position as an officer in this horrendous manner.” 

He added that the culture and standards of the police force are being reformed after an interim review. A new police hotline for anonymous complaints and anti-corruption team has recently been established by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley. 

“But more can and must be done,” Khan added. “It’s vital that all victims of crime have confidence in our police, and we simply must do more to raise standards and empower police leaders to rid the Met and all other police services of those officers who are clearly unfit to serve.”