A police drive was advised an officer had “repeatedly asked a 15-year-old girl to send naked pictures of herself” earlier than he went on to commit a baby sexual offence, a brand new inspection has discovered.
The incident was flagged as one in all a minimum of 5 alternatives misplaced by Thames Valley Police to take stricter motion towards former PC Luke Horner earlier than he engaged in penetrative sexual exercise with a baby aged 13 on 11 June this yr.
The Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley commissioned His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) to think about if there had been any misplaced alternatives in how the drive handled intelligence and knowledge referring to Horner throughout his service.
HMICFRS concluded Thames Valley Police couldn’t have moderately anticipated Horner would commit sexual offences towards a baby.
But the inspectorate discovered the drive misplaced a minimum of 5 alternatives to take stricter motion towards him, each on the preliminary vetting stage and through his police service, which might have led to him being refused preliminary vetting clearance or being dismissed.
Horner, who resigned as an officer on 26 July, travelled to Rushden in Northamptonshire whereas off obligation to commit the offence, which he additionally recorded on his sufferer’s cellphone, the courtroom heard.
He was jailed earlier this month for six years and 4 months.
The drive ought to have made additional inquiries on the preliminary vetting stage into two separate points – a possible sexual assault allegation in 2016 and his early departure from the British Army, HMICFRS discovered.
During his police service the drive did not determine that there have been questions on his honesty and integrity after a number of incidents – and when thought of collectively, these incidents “clearly indicated that Horner was not suited to being a police officer”.
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During Horner’s police service, the drive’s counter-corruption unit acquired nameless intelligence from Crimestoppers which prompt he had been chatting on-line to a 15-year-old woman and had “repeatedly” requested her to ship him bare footage of herself.
The counter-corruption unit made one try and contact the one who gave the knowledge to Crimestoppers, however the inspectorate stated the unit ought to have made “repeated and exhaustive attempts” to contact them inside the 14-day interval the communication channel remained open.
Supervisors additionally recognized that Horner “did not always handle evidence correctly” – in a single incident officers discovered some hashish in Horner’s work tray and in one other, he took numerous gadgets of proof house in his bag, which he later reported stolen.
In one other incident, he pointed his taser at a colleague and activated the crimson dot laser – on the time he was the topic of a dwell written warning for the mishandling of proof, so the inspectorate believes the skilled requirements division ought to have “without hesitation” assessed the behaviour as gross misconduct, which might have led to a gross misconduct listening to, with a possible final result of dismissal.
Source: information.sky.com”