Police breached the human rights of two victims of serial rapist and black cab driver John Worboys, the Supreme Court has held.
Both women, NBV and DSD, reported their assault. In NBV’s case, Worboys was arrested but released without charge. In DSD’s case, he was never identified. Worboys, believed to have had at least 100 victims, was later convicted of 19 assaults. Both women claimed the police breached their Art 3 rights by failing to carry out effective investigations into their complaints.
Delivering the main judgment in Commrs Metropolitan Police v DSD & Anor [2018] UKSC 11 this week Lord Kerr said: ‘There was disagreement between us as to whether liability under the Human Rights Act arose only where there had been systematic failures or whether deficiencies in the actual investigation would be enough to make the police liable.
‘By a majority, we have held that failures in the investigations of crimes, provided they are sufficiently serious, will give rise to liability on the part of the police. There were such serious deficiencies in this case.’
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