Wayne Couzens, the police officer sentenced to life in prison for kidnapping, raping and killing Sarah Everard, could he be stopped before his “brutal act”? Maybe yes She The former British policewoman was found guilty of “gross negligence” and misconduct Samantha Leeaccused in the context of an internal investigation a Scotland Yard of having in fact covered up a disciplinary investigation into the colleague who was the protagonist of the most serious of the many recent scandals involving the Metropolitan Police in London. Couzens massacred in 2021 – after a false arrest – the 33-year-old, the victim of one of the most shocking feminicides committed in the capital of the Kingdom.
Lee, who formerly served in the police inspectorate, had been called in to investigate Couzens before the murder, following reports of suspected sexual abuse already emerged on the future uniformed killer; most notably for having earlier harassed McDonald’s shop assistants in at least two incidents of exhibitionism. However, he had shelved the file “without conducting adequate investigative insights”. In the meantime, having resigned from the ranks of the police, the former official defended herself by admitting “errors” in the investigation procedure, but denying serious negligence on her part: negligence for which she has instead now been held responsible in the context of the review of all internal investigations and the general cleanup promised by the new head of Scotland Yard, Mark Rowleyto avoid a hypothetical dissolution after the storm of criticism and revelations that hit the main British police force.
Sarah Everard, 33, had disappeared while walking home to her home in Brixton on the evening of 3 March 2021 and was found dead on Wednesday 10 March in Ashford, Kent, approximately 78 kilometers from the last place where she had been seen. The woman had decided to walk the 50 minutes to her home in south London. A brief conversation on the cell phone at 21.30 with the partner, then nothing. It was the latter who reported her missing to the police the next day. At the same time that Sarah was setting off, never to return home, not far away, Couzens was dismounting after a shift on guard duty at the American Embassy. Nothing would have linked the two people if it hadn’t been for a series of images captured by various security cameras mounted on street cornersand, on the intercoms of houses and on buses, which showed Couzens’ car in the vicinity of where the girl had given signs of life the last time. The car was followed, camera after camera, to the Kent village where the agent, who joined the Metropolitan Police in 2018, lives. The 33-year-old’s body was found in woods not far from the agent’s home in Ashford, in Kent, wrapped in a plastic rubble bag and recognized only by his dentures.