The second part of a major inquiry into the murder of Sarah Everard has delivered a damning verdict on police and government inaction, cataloguing a series of repeated and preventable failures in tackling misogyny and sexual predators within the forces of England and Wales.
A Catalogue of Unheeded Warnings
Lady Elish Angiolini's latest report, published this week, reveals that a crucial recommendation from her first report in February 2023 has still not been fully enacted. That initial recommendation called for a blanket ban on recruiting anyone with a caution or conviction for a sexual offence into the police.
It took police chiefs 18 months to agree to the ban, and even then it was omitted from draft Home Office regulations issued in September 2024. The Home Office has now confirmed the ban will be included, but it will not be applied retrospectively. This delay is particularly shocking given that Angiolini's first report detailed the "lamentable and repeated" missed opportunities to stop Wayne Couzens, the serving officer who abducted, raped, and murdered Sarah Everard in 2021.
The Scale of the Problem Within Policing
The report sheds new light on the extent of the issue. It discloses that in the 2023-24 period, checks against the police national database led to 461 police officers, staff, and volunteers being referred to "an appropriate authority". These checks resulted in nine new criminal investigations and 88 disciplinary investigations.
Angiolini's findings show that, more than four years after Everard's murder, a quarter of police forces in England and Wales have still not implemented basic policies for investigating sexual offences. Efforts to reduce violence against women and girls (VAWG) are described as "fragmented, underfunded and overly reliant on short-term solutions." A 2023 promise to give VAWG the same priority as terrorism in crime prevention has not been honoured.
"Too often prevention in this space remains just words," Angiolini states bluntly. She also notes that the Labour government, which won power 18 months ago with a pledge to halve VAWG within a decade, has yet to reveal its strategy for delivering on that promise.
A Culture of Disbelief and Inaction
The report identifies a deep-seated culture of disbelief as a core problem. This extends beyond scepticism of individual victims to an underlying attitude among some officers that rape is not a serious crime. A report for the National Police Chiefs' Council and the Home Office three years ago admitted investigations were being hampered by officers dismissing rape allegations as "regretful sex."
Angiolini emphasises that the focus must shift decisively to the perpetrators. This call aligns with the announcement by Justice Secretary David Lammy on Tuesday that rape victims will no longer be portrayed as serial liars in courtrooms. Victim-blaming, the report argues, has been allowed to fester for too long within a criminal justice system that has failed to root out officers who share the mindset of offenders.
The Angiolini report stands as a stark indictment of systemic failure. It underscores that despite numerous reviews and public outcry following tragedies like the murders committed by Couzens and the serial offences of officer David Carrick, impunity for sexual predators within and outside the police remains disturbingly common. The path forward, the report insists, requires unwavering focus on the perpetrators and finally turning promises into concrete, funded action.
