Ex-British police officer, jailed for murder, convicted of indecent exposure

LONDON: A former British police officer sentenced to life in prison for murder was sentenced to a further 19 months in prison on Monday for indecent disclosure, raising questions as to whether he could have been stopped sooner.

Wayne Couzens, 50, is already serving a rare life sentence for the kidnapping, rape and murder of London resident Sarah Everard after he pulled her off the streets in March 2021.

He admitted to indecently exposing himself to other women in November 2020 and February 2021 and showed no emotion when he appeared via video link from prison for his sentencing at London’s Old Bailey Criminal Court.

“Four months after you exposed yourself to me, you raped and murdered an innocent woman,” one of his victims, a cyclist, said in a statement to the court.

“There were ways to identify you and they weren’t used. When I reported your crime, I didn’t feel like it was being taken as seriously as I thought it should have been,” she said.

“The horror of what happened will stay with me for the rest of my life.”

The cyclist was unable to confirm the number plate of Couzens’ car to police after he stood and exposed himself on a country lane in Kent, south-east England.

But details of the car were fully captured by surveillance camera as it again exposed itself to female employees at a fast-food restaurant in the fortnight before attacking Everard.

Getting away with his sexual assault only fueled “a dangerous belief in his invincibility,” Judge Juliet May said in her sentencing.

Since Everard’s murder, more shocking cases involving London police officers have come to light.

David Carrick was sentenced a month ago to life in prison with a minimum sentence of more than 30 years for dozens of rapes and sexual assaults dating back to 2002.

Carrick and Couzens once served in the same armed unit protecting MPs and foreign diplomats.

The government has commissioned an independent inquiry into how the officers evaded detection, and London’s Metropolitan Police are pursuing a crackdown on their ranks. -AFP