‘It’s like watching a TV drama’: what happens when police go rogue – and get caught?

At the Metropolitan police misconduct hearings officers face charges of drunkenness, racism and improper sexual relations. Can the force ever clean up its act?

On an August evening in 2019, two police officers responded to a 999 call from a distressed woman whose partner was violently attempting to push her out of the flat they shared. On the call recording, the woman, Miss A, can be heard crying while her boyfriend shouts in the background. When the officers, PC Paul Onslow and a colleague, arrived at the flat, Miss A’s clothes were ripped and she had a cut on her thumb.

Onslow arrested the boyfriend, drove him to a police station and returned to Miss A’s flat where he began to conduct a domestic violence risk assessment, a tick-box process designed to help police officers make sure that victims are protected from harm. Officers must run through a list of 27 questions, including: “Are you very frightened?”, “Do you feel isolated?”, “Are you having suicidal thoughts?”, “Has your partner ever threatened to kill you?”. In a breach of regulations, Onslow turned off his body-worn camera before embarking on the questionnaire. Halfway through the list, he went off-piste to ask Miss A: “Do you fancy me?”

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