DAME Cressida Dick ‘felt intimidated’ into stepping down as Metropolitan Police Commissioner after an ultimatum from London Labour Mayor, Sadiq Khan, according to a review into her leaving her post.
She quit in February when the mayor of London said he had lost confidence in her leadership.
Home Secretary, Priti Patel asked the then chief inspector of constabulary, Sir Tom Winsor, to carry out a review into the handling of Dame Cressida’s exit.
Winsor has found that the mayor’s actions ‘were not in accordance with the relevant legislation’.
Khan commented that the review was ‘clearly biased’ and ‘ignores the facts’.
Dick, the first woman to lead the UK’s biggest police force, faced damning criticism over the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving Met police officer last year, and a series of other scandals.
These scandals began with her order to police, to shoot to kill Jean Paul de Menezez in 2005, an entirely innocent person, as a suspected terrorist.
Under her regime, after the murder of Stephen Lawrence, the Met was found to be ‘institutionally racist’ by the MacPherson Inquiry.
In June – months after Dick quit – the Met was placed into an advanced stage of monitoring, in what the home secretary described as ‘special measures’.
Khan said: ‘On the former Commissioner’s watch, trust in the police fell to record lows following a litany of terrible scandals.
‘What happened was simple – I lost confidence in the former Commissioner’s ability to make the changes needed and she then chose to stand aside.
‘Londoners elected me to hold the Met Commissioner to account and that’s exactly what I have done.
‘I make absolutely no apology for demanding better for London and for putting the interests of the city I love first. I will continue working with the new Commissioner to reduce crime and to rebuild trust and confidence in the police.’
Her last scandal was the murder of Sarah Everard by a serving Met Police officer, with a record of indecent exposure and a nickname of ‘the rapist’.
Dame Dick said she was ‘so sorry’, but remained.
After the heavy-handed way the force handled subsequent protests and vigils – in which clashes broke out between women and police officers trying to control the gathering, Dick said confidence in policing was damaged because of remarks made on social media rather than the actions of any Met officers.
Misogyny, discrimination, bullying and sexual harassment throughout the ranks of the Met were uncovered in a damning report from the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC).
A report into the 1987 murder of Daniel Morgan – the killer remains unidentified – accused the force of institutional corruption. It found that the then-Assistant Commissioner Dame Cressida had initially refused to grant access to a police internal data system.
Last September it was announced by the prime minister and home secretary that Dame Cressida’s contract – due to end in April – would be extended for another two years.
It spurred victims of police injustice to write an open letter accusing Dame Cressida of ‘presiding over a culture of incompetence and cover-up’.
She has gone but the Met police remains. It is time that it was completely disbanded, and the capitalist state apparatus was broken up and replaced by a workers militia.
