investigation report
Scotland Yard may overlook serial killers
The Metropolitan Police Headquarters in London: Is policing neglected here? photo
© Alastair Grant/AP/dpa
Does the British criminal police make serious mistakes in their work to the detriment of the population? Quite possible, so the result of a supervisory authority.
Because deaths are not properly investigated, the police in London may miss an entire series of murders. That’s the worrying conclusion of an inquiry into the work of the Metropolitan Police released last night.
The inspectors of the supervisory authority HMICFRS (His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services) certified that the police authority, also known as Scotland Yard, has still not learned from mistakes that led to the avoidable deaths of three young men in 2014 and 2015.
Flashback: Eight years ago
At the time, a serial killer poisoned four victims with knockout drops and dumped the lifeless bodies near his home in the east London borough of Barking. However, the police initially saw no connection between the deaths. An investigation later found that he could have been convicted after the first murder had the police done their job properly.
“The Met[Metropolitan Police]has not learned enough from their mistakes of eight years ago and clearly what happened then could happen again,” Inspector of the Constabulary Matt Parr, who led the investigation, told the PA news agency. Some investigators are said to have openly admitted that they find commonalities between unexplained deaths more by luck than by the rigorous application of standard procedures.
According to the regulator, the police are called in London every day because of 30 unexpected deaths. That’s about 10,000 cases a year. Of these, however, only two to three per week would be classified as homicides. “It seems likely, if not certain, to me that among the deaths not classified as homicide there are some,” Parr said.