Sarah Everard inquiry to publish report over women’s safety in public spaces

The 33-year-old marketing executive was abducted, raped and murdered by the former armed Metropolitan Police officer in March 2021.

He had used his status as a police officer to trick Ms Everard into thinking he could arrest her for breaking lockdown rules, as she walked home from a friend’s house in south London.

The Angiolini Inquiry was launched after Ms Everard’s death to investigate how Couzens was able to carry out his crimes, and look at wider issues within policing and women’s safety.

On Tuesday the probe will report back on what measures currently exist to stop sexually-motivated crimes against women in public spaces as its first report of Part 2 of its work.

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Last year the first phase of the independent investigation published its findings into Couzens’ policing career and discovered he should never have been given a job as a police officer.

The inquiry found chances to stop the sexual predator were repeatedly ignored and missed, and chairwoman Lady Elish Angiolini warned without a radical overhaul of policing practices and culture, there is “nothing to stop another Couzens operating in plain sight”.

Ms Everard’s family said in response to the inquiry’s first report they believe she died because he was a police officer, adding: “She would never have got into a stranger’s car.”

After the harrowing killing of Ms Everard, it emerged there had been concerns about Couzens’ behaviour while he was a police officer, with reports he was nicknamed “the rapist”.

He joined Kent Police as a special constable in 2002, became an officer with the Civil Nuclear Constabulary in 2011 and then moved to the Met in 2018.

Couzens indecently exposed himself three times before the murder, including twice at a drive-through fast food restaurant in Kent in the days before the murder, but he was not caught.

It was also later revealed Couzens had been part of a WhatsApp group with fellow officers that shared disturbing racist, homophobic and misogynist remarks.

He was sentenced to a whole-life order for Ms Everard’s murder, meaning he will never be released from prison.

Responding to the inquiry’s findings the then-home secretary James Cleverly announced any officer charged with the most serious offences will be automatically suspended from duty until an outcome is reached.

Police reforms to drive up standards are also under way under the current Government, including new rules for officers who commit gross misconduct or fail background checks to be automatically sacked.

Part 2 of the Angiolini Inquiry is also looking at whether there is a risk of issues from the first phase happening again, such as failures in police vetting, police culture and poor police investigation into reports of sexual offences.

The report is expected to be published next year.

A third phase of the inquiry will also consider the crimes of David Carrick – who also served in the Met’s Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection Command and was handed 36 life sentences in 2023 after being unmasked as a serial rapist.

Earlier this month he was handed another life sentence for molesting a 12-year-old girl and raping a former partner.