Daily Podcast Strip searches in police custody
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00:00 I'm Neil Paterson, welcome to the Sky News Daily.
00:03 We're going to split this into two parts.
00:04 A little later we will be addressing Nigel Farage, the Coots Bank and the accusations
00:09 that have led the boss of NatWest to announce that she'll be departing from her post.
00:13 A lot more on that later.
00:15 But we begin with some original journalism by one of our own here at Sky News.
00:18 Police in Greater Manchester have in essence been accused of unnecessary and invasive strip
00:24 searches of women without explanation behind the door of a cell.
00:30 Sky News has been speaking to three women, one of whom says she was detained for 41 hours
00:34 and has alleged that she was sexually assaulted whilst in custody.
00:37 The journalist responsible for this story, Jason Farrell, Sky's home editor.
00:41 Jason, great to have you on and we should say at the outset that there will undoubtedly
00:46 be material that you and I are discussing over the course of the next few minutes that
00:49 some people will find distressing, particularly the point at which we start.
00:54 Tell me what these three women have said happened to them whilst in police custody.
00:59 And we should remember that at the heart of the story.
01:01 So three women, one police station, although obviously strip searches happen up and down
01:06 the country.
01:07 These happened over the course of three different years actually.
01:10 First one in 2021 was a woman called Zayna.
01:12 It was a welfare call.
01:14 Police came into her house after someone had seen her on Zoom on cocaine and thought that
01:17 she was overdosed.
01:19 They came in to her house.
01:21 She knocked the glasses off a police officer's face and was arrested.
01:24 We get the body cam footage of her being arrested and taken into the van.
01:29 It then cuts out.
01:30 So we know that an officer got in the van because we see that from a different CCTV,
01:35 but we don't see any footage from inside the van.
01:38 And it's a 10 minute journey to the police station from where she's picked up.
01:41 But actually we don't see her again for about another hour and a half.
01:44 So that's a question for her.
01:46 She wants to know what happened in that time.
01:47 We don't see her being checked into the police station.
01:49 There should be a CCTV in the area where she's checked in.
01:52 We don't see that.
01:53 So the first time we pick her up again is when she's being taken into the police cell.
01:58 And by this time she's unconscious.
02:00 She's clearly been unconscious for a while.
02:02 She has no recollection of what happened in the van.
02:04 She's carried in, her head's being held down as she's put onto some blue mattresses and
02:09 her hands are behind her back, handcuffed.
02:12 She's clearly not a threat to anybody because she's out of it.
02:15 My jeans are taken down, my underwear is cut off, knickers and the bra, as well as my top.
02:22 They then put oversized, custom shorts with a belt on and leave me face down in the cell,
02:31 still unconscious, with no top on and no blanket given.
02:35 There's a blanket left in the cell but she's not covered up.
02:37 So she's just left there, flopped, head down on the floor.
02:42 And there is a question of duty of care here.
02:44 Zaina feels she should have been taken to hospital, not to a police cell.
02:48 She's unconscious due to potentially an overdose of drugs.
02:52 I wasn't a suicide risk at the time.
02:56 I was unconscious so I needed medical attention.
02:59 But instead of providing an unconscious female medical attention, they thought, I know, let's
03:07 take her clothes off instead and leave her there naked.
03:10 These days, you're in a police cell, there will be a camera on you at all times.
03:13 That's right.
03:14 There is a camera on you at all times and you can ask for it.
03:16 You can ask for the custody logs as well, which she did.
03:19 And the first thing we have to say is it took her a long time to get hold of them.
03:22 She got hold of the logs first.
03:24 And the logs do not match the video.
03:26 So the strip search is not logged at all.
03:29 And normally you'd have to give a justification for that.
03:31 You'd have to explain why you were doing it.
03:34 There's medical examinations that are logged that don't happen.
03:37 There's an alleged assault on a police officer that doesn't happen.
03:40 But most worrying of all is she thinks that she was sexually assaulted and raped in the
03:46 police cell or in police custody, either in the police van on the way there.
03:49 Her memory is very, very sketchy, but that's what she believes happened.
03:53 If her memory is sketchy, on what basis is she alleging a sexual assault?
03:57 She goes from a position of looking like she's sobering up and then an hour of footage is
04:02 missing.
04:03 And then an hour later, she's topless and she's behaving in a very sexual manner.
04:06 So she believes she was drugged.
04:09 Probably another explanation is that the other drugs that she'd taken were kicking in.
04:13 But her point is that when she went to the hospital, which she went to immediately afterwards,
04:19 she complained of having pains in certain places, pointing to certain body parts.
04:26 And she said that she thought she'd been sexually assaulted.
04:30 And examinations show that some of her injuries were consistent with that.
04:34 So she has simply asked for the footage to show what happened.
04:39 And the fact that they've not provided it obviously leads to further suspicion on her
04:44 behalf.
04:45 Why would you withhold footage?
04:46 The very footage that could either prove or disprove my allegations you will not part
04:51 with.
04:52 Who's got something to hide?
04:53 I'm openly saying that at some point during my detention with Greater Manchester Police,
04:58 I was drugged and sexually assaulted.
05:01 Prove me wrong.
05:02 Give me the footage.
05:03 We'll return to that story in just a second.
05:05 But again, we have three separate women on separate occasions alleging the same thing.
05:12 Take us through the other two.
05:13 So not rape or sexual assault, but certainly with regards to the strip searches, they are
05:18 saying that their strip searches were unjustified.
05:21 And they question the motives behind the strip searches.
05:25 So one is a woman who was accused of blackmail.
05:29 She was accused of blackmail by someone who she had accused of sexually assaulting her
05:32 sister.
05:33 And she is taken in, she is strip searched and she's completely naked.
05:39 And she says there's no justification for it.
05:41 She thinks that it is perhaps because she had complained about the way the police investigated
05:46 her sister's case and that they were heavy handed with her because of that.
05:51 They said to me they were going to strip search me.
05:53 So I was like, strip search me for what?
05:55 Because they said I'm concealing.
05:56 I said, I'm not concealing nothing.
05:58 They told me if I didn't go in, they were basically going to tackle me to the floor
06:01 and take my clothes off me anyway.
06:02 So power.
06:03 It was all power.
06:04 Police on a power trip to shut me up.
06:08 It's to make me scared.
06:10 It's to show we're boss, not you.
06:12 The third example is perhaps the most shocking in many ways, because here is a woman who
06:17 has gone to the police station to find her partner who is being held in custody for alleged
06:25 domestic abuse against her.
06:26 She needs the keys to get home.
06:29 And she calls the police from outside the station and is eventually accused of malicious
06:34 communications.
06:35 In other words, put bluntly, swearing at the police over the phone.
06:38 The police then demand a strip search.
06:39 And she's not clear as to why they strip searched her.
06:43 But we asked several times what was the justification and eventually told that she was potentially
06:49 concealing a vape.
06:52 So if your police justified to strip search you if they believe that you are withholding
06:58 something you shouldn't have.
06:59 So obvious thing, a weapon.
07:03 Second most obvious thing, drugs.
07:05 Third most obvious thing, perhaps less obvious, but crucial evidence maybe you could say.
07:10 But also this is a woman who's suffered potentially, allegedly, and she's, you know, they should
07:16 know this is a domestic abuse.
07:20 She's strip searched.
07:21 And I'm going to be graphic here because I think we have to be.
07:25 She's covering herself and she's asked to spread her legs and she's asked to completely
07:31 open up and and then the reverse side.
07:35 Once I've taken everything off, I was like holding my stomach a little bit, trying to
07:41 keep my dignity.
07:43 And then she said, no, you need to sit down and open your legs.
07:47 And then I was a bit like apprehensive to open my legs.
07:51 And then she was like, no, you need to open them fully so I can see I can see in there.
07:57 Were these police officers who were strip searching you aware that you were an alleged
08:02 victim of a domestic abuse assault only the night before?
08:07 Yeah, they were aware.
08:10 They're looking for a vape.
08:12 And you have to ask about the proportionality of this.
08:14 I mean, she doesn't, you know, and with each part of a police strip search, you know, you
08:18 have to say, is this part of the strip search necessary?
08:22 You know, you can't just say, OK, we're going to strip search.
08:25 You've got to reach a point.
08:26 And perhaps that point is if you're looking for a vape, perhaps that point is after you
08:29 strip someone down their underwear.
08:30 Do you really need to go that much further?
08:32 So these are the questions around accountability and the way in which these things are conducted,
08:36 which I think are raised quite graphically and horrifically in all of these cases.
08:42 Let's just return to Zaina for a second.
08:44 I mean, she only discovered the detail of what happened to her when through that subject
08:50 access request, she got access to the CCTV and the police logs and was able to essentially
08:57 drop a chronology of the time that she spent in police custody and noticed that there were
09:02 gaps there.
09:03 There's a very messy chronology from the custody logs, which incidentally say a number of times
09:08 she's not fit to be detained.
09:10 And yet, you know, there she stays.
09:12 So for a while, that's all she's got.
09:14 So it's when she gets the video footage, which is provided all jumbled up and once put together,
09:21 shows there are these two missing hours.
09:23 One is quite concerning because she goes from being fully clothed and acting relatively
09:26 normally to not acting normally at all and naked.
09:31 And she spends a lot of the time in the cell naked.
09:35 And that's one of the reasons why I got my producer, Liz Lane, to go through all the
09:39 footage and look at it, you know, because it needed looking at in details to what exactly
09:44 happened.
09:45 At one point she's bleeding and that's not logged either.
09:49 So there's all these things that she didn't know about because she was having a psychotic
09:53 episode in the cell and she is vulnerable.
09:56 Tell me what Greater Manchester Police are saying about these three individual cases.
10:02 One has to assume there is some form of an investigation going.
10:06 Greater Manchester Police say they're committed to delivering an outstanding service.
10:09 They say GMP is aware that these three individuals are unhappy with the service they received
10:13 when they were arrested and detained.
10:15 Their complaints have or are being investigated by the force.
10:19 Though one investigation is ongoing, there's currently no evidence to suggest any GMP employees
10:24 have misconducted themselves or committed a criminal offence.
10:28 Under the definition within the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, two of these individuals
10:32 were not strip searched.
10:34 Due to concerns for their welfare, their clothing was removed and replaced with anti-rip garments.
10:39 And this process is subject to different legislation and guidance.
10:44 And as of speaking, I haven't seen what that different legislation and guidance is to what
10:49 they would be guided to under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.
10:53 OK, so let's be absolutely clear about this.
10:56 The police, despite requests, have not been able to furnish you with the legislation and
11:01 the guidelines that they say that they are working to.
11:04 They said they were going to go back to their lawyers and provide it a few days ago and
11:07 they haven't yet.
11:08 We await that with interest.
11:10 Secondly, as I understand it, the Mayor of Manchester's office has intimated that Greater
11:16 Manchester Police is in possession of all of the appropriate CCTV that we've been referring
11:23 to here.
11:24 And in Zaina's case, that suggests that Greater Manchester Police, so far without explanation,
11:31 have not been willing to hand over parts of that footage.
11:35 We've put all of this to the Mayor's office and we have, I've asked for an interview.
11:41 I mean, they did offer a few weeks ago a statement.
11:44 I said I wanted an interview.
11:47 And I've asked them again today.
11:48 They say they are going to speak to us in the coming days.
11:53 I can also say that Andy Burnham met with one of the women, Kirsty, yesterday and had
12:03 a proper conversation with her about this.
12:07 But with Zaina's case, yes, what they are told is that the footage exists.
12:13 That's what Zaina's been told from the Mayor's office.
12:17 Just for the sake of absolute clarity here, you presumably have asked Greater Manchester
12:22 Police why this footage has not been made available.
12:25 I have, and I've just been given this statement, which I just read to you.
12:29 So there has been no direct answer to where is this?
12:32 They've not said it was accidentally deleted.
12:35 We've directly asked.
12:36 They've not said that it's been lost, you know, accidentally.
12:39 They've not said there's some national security reason.
12:41 No, no, they've not answered the question.
12:44 The statement that I've read you is what they've responded with.
12:47 I've also been speaking to those who formerly worked with GMP, Chief Superintendent Martin
12:53 Harding.
12:54 I mean, he is very critical of the way in which this has been handled.
12:58 Yeah, so Martin Harding, he was a custody officer as well.
13:01 He says it's the worst custody records he's ever seen.
13:06 He says that he, I mean, when I said are you suspicious, he said, I think she was raped.
13:14 I've seen no justification at all.
13:16 I expected to see on the custody record, the custody sergeant give the authority and explain
13:22 the grounds for the requirement for a strip search.
13:25 I've seen none of that on the custody record.
13:28 I believe she was raped.
13:29 I believe she was raped by an officer.
13:30 And I believe the organisation is covering up.
13:34 And that's his conclusion.
13:36 I mean, these three women, Zayna, Kirstie and Maria, Kirstie and Maria as we're calling
13:41 them, exceptionally brave to be able to articulate what they think may have happened to them.
13:48 But I suppose, once again, and you've alluded to this already, policing in the United Kingdom
13:53 at the moment is in pretty low dungeon and it's held in not the greatest respect, predominantly
13:59 because of what has been happening closer to us here in London than in Manchester.
14:05 But one would have assumed that on occasions like this, police forces, chief constables
14:11 would be desperate to ensure that their officers working on the front line with women are working
14:19 well, are doing what they should do.
14:21 I mean, there is absolutely no accusation that is made about their police force that
14:28 is not investigated promptly and fully.
14:31 Absolutely.
14:32 You would hope, wouldn't you?
14:34 And the Casey review was scathing, damning about the way in which the Met police had
14:42 not done enough to tackle misogyny, had not done enough to look at the way crimes against
14:47 women were investigated.
14:49 This is not just an issue that affects the Met.
14:52 Police are here to protect us.
14:54 And the vast majority of them are doing their job and doing it well.
15:01 And it's just that there is a problem at the moment that there have been people like David
15:06 Carrick and Wayne Cousins who've brought a cloud onto the police.
15:12 But sadly as well, there has been ample evidence of a kind of undercurrent of misogyny as well
15:19 within the police force.
15:21 So it's absolutely crucial that the top brass within the police come out and make sure that
15:27 when something like this comes along, it's dealt with quickly and efficiently and it
15:31 doesn't seem to have happened here.
15:33 It doesn't.
15:34 Well, Jason, we wait to hear what we will hear and I'm sure we will be hearing more
15:38 from Greater Manchester Police.
15:40 For now, though, thanks very much.
15:43 Well, let's move on to the second story of the podcast.
15:47 Nigel Farage and the ongoing saga involving bank accounts or the lack thereof at Cootes
15:53 Bank.
15:54 We've had another dramatic twist today when Dame Alison Rose, the boss of NatWest, which
15:59 owns Cootes Bank, she resigned from her position.
16:03 Let's delve into this with our business correspondent, Paul Kelso.
16:06 Paul, good to talk to you again.
16:08 Just bring us right up to date with where we are with the story, because it basically
16:12 started about a month ago, didn't it, when Nigel Farage got on Twitter and complained
16:17 that he was being turned into a non-person, that the establishment was trying to force
16:22 him out of the UK by closing his bank account.
16:24 Yes, he claimed he was being debanked.
16:27 Another charming phrase we can add to the journalist's lexicon.
16:32 And he said it was because of his political views.
16:33 He didn't at that stage say who he was being debanked by, but it was quickly reported that
16:38 he had an account with Cootes, the bank of monarchs and magnates, 300 years old, owned
16:44 these days by NatWest.
16:46 And he claimed it was on political grounds.
16:48 They didn't like his politics, so they were going to close down his accounts.
16:52 There followed a few weeks of pretty fevered speculation, some briefing around why it might
16:57 be.
16:58 Cootes, when we and others contacted them, pointed us towards their eligibility criteria,
17:03 which said you had to have more than seven figures either invested in the bank or borrowed
17:10 from the bank to qualify.
17:13 The key moment in this was the BBC then reported what felt like a really juicy little exclusive
17:18 scoop that it was not politics, but it was in fact those eligibility criteria that was
17:24 the reason Farage was being told he couldn't have an account.
17:27 He didn't have enough money.
17:29 That was the BBC's business editor, Simon Jack, extremely experienced, extremely high
17:33 profile journalist.
17:36 Within a few days, Nigel Farage showed that story to be not entirely true.
17:40 He published a dossier compiled by Cootes, got it through what's called a subject access
17:45 request.
17:46 Send me everything you know about me.
17:47 Anyone can do it to their bank.
17:49 And it was a remarkable document, really, that went through his entire career and pointed
17:53 out that some people think he's a racist, a xenophobe.
17:56 It called him a disingenuous grifter.
17:58 And all of this, they said, was essentially they were concerned that Farage would damage
18:02 Cootes' reputation.
18:04 So they wanted to ease him out of the bank.
18:06 Boy, has that exploded in the other direction.
18:09 It's been disastrous for Nat West.
18:11 It was revealed Alison Rose sat next to Simon Jack, the journalist in question, at a BBC
18:17 charity event.
18:19 Was she the source?
18:20 Well, on Tuesday evening, she said, I was the source of this story.
18:24 It was inaccurate.
18:25 I didn't have the full picture.
18:26 She apologized to Mr. Farage.
18:29 The board said they still had confidence in her.
18:32 It felt pretty thin, that position, and pretty hard to maintain.
18:36 Sure enough, eight hours later, she was resigning after the prime minister and chancellor made
18:40 clear they didn't have faith in her.
18:42 Why does that matter?
18:43 Well, the taxpayer owns 38% of Nat West.
18:47 They're major investors, as well as having a big political stake in the culture wars
18:51 that this bank has been dragged into.
18:53 And Rose went in the early hours, Britain's highest profile businesswoman, out of a job.
19:00 What if she had provided Simon Jack with accurate information?
19:05 Should the chief executive, should the boss of a bank, be talking about the individual
19:11 relationship that they have with any of their clients?
19:14 It is hard to think of something more damaging than the boss of a bank discussing confidential
19:20 financial information of an individual, never mind a high profile individual, with a journalist.
19:27 It's simply not done.
19:29 It's the foundation stone of banking on that.
19:32 Everyone's right, I know this.
19:33 When we try and make inquiries, when we made initial inquiries about this story, that's
19:36 what we were told.
19:37 I have the odd contact I know within Nat West.
19:41 You couldn't get blood from a stone on this.
19:44 They stuck to it.
19:45 Alison Rose maintains that when she spoke to Simon Jack, lots of this was in the public
19:49 domain already.
19:50 She stuck to what was out there.
19:51 She didn't disclose any personal private financial details.
19:55 And she spoke only in general terms.
19:59 Given the story was inaccurate, given Mr Farage's doggedness with this, that position was really
20:07 hard to maintain.
20:08 She still, I think, would say she didn't breach his confidentiality.
20:13 But it's a dreadful look for the boss of a bank, much more so one that's publicly owned
20:18 in part.
20:19 Yeah, I mean, I must be one of the few people on the planet who's actually sat down and
20:22 read all 40 pages of that internal Coutts document.
20:27 And it does make it clear that there are concerns about Nigel Farage's politics, but there are
20:32 also financial reasons.
20:34 And this may well be why Dame Alison stuck to her gun so long, but there are financial
20:39 reasons why they were bringing that relationship to an end.
20:43 But just in terms of the regulations, I mean, can a bank cancel someone's account on the
20:48 basis of their political opinions?
20:51 That is pretty clear.
20:52 The government says they cannot and should not.
20:55 It is a grey area.
20:57 Plainly, the banks will all say they don't do it.
21:01 Really interestingly, Nigel Farage has received at least two apologies from NatWest so far.
21:06 He's got more apologies from them than he has bank accounts, as by my count.
21:11 But neither of them has been for the decision to take away his or ease him out, get him
21:17 a glide path, as they put it, to exit from Coutts.
21:20 They've apologized for the process and the dossier.
21:22 Alison Rose has apologized for talking to journalists about it.
21:24 But they haven't apologized for that decision.
21:26 And that's because they still maintain it was a commercial decision.
21:31 But they say it's commercial, but informed not simply by pounds and pence, but by the
21:38 potential damage to the bank's reputation, its values and purpose, as they put it.
21:44 NatWest, deliberately under Alison Rose, has adopted a social purpose.
21:49 Part of the reaction to being the bank that was bailed out with the most taxpayer money
21:53 after the financial crash.
21:55 So they would still say it was a commercial decision, although informed by the rather
21:59 nebulous values.
22:00 And that, of course, has come crashing head on into Nigel Farage's disquiet and upset
22:09 with woke values permeating businesses, banking, as he would put it.
22:13 And that might be a bit of a bubble issue.
22:15 I'm not sure how much this plays out there with ordinary NatWest customers.
22:19 But certainly inside the political world, it has lit a fire.
22:24 And the prime minister and the chancellor of the Exchequer have happily fallen in.
22:29 On principle, I think they agree, and many others would.
22:32 Politics shouldn't decide whether you can have a bank account.
22:34 So where does this go from here, Paul?
22:36 I mean, I see that Nigel Farage is calling for the heads of every single member of the
22:40 NatWest board.
22:41 I don't see that one happening.
22:42 But as you've intimated, senior politicians from the prime minister down have rushed to
22:48 Nigel Farage's defence.
22:49 I mean, could it be that we will see the regulations changed?
22:53 The treasury secretary has held a meeting on Wednesday with 19 bank and building society
23:00 bosses.
23:01 He has, that was initially called as a bit of a banging heads together on this issue,
23:06 emphasising freedom of expression of customers was paramount.
23:09 They should never be punished for their political beliefs.
23:13 There's going to be a tweak to regulations.
23:16 Customers will have the right to demand to know more about why an account is being closed.
23:20 And they'll have a longer period, 90 days grace, so that they can pursue any complaint
23:25 with the ombudsman, etc.
23:27 So all the banks are saying they will absolutely adhere by this.
23:29 I think it's sent a bit of a chill down the spine of the industry, the way this has, the
23:35 way this is escalated.
23:36 But it does raise really interesting points about how capitalism is informed by values
23:44 of its customers.
23:45 I would say NatWest has adopted a greater social purpose under Alison Rose's leadership.
23:50 Well, delivered its biggest profits since the crash.
23:55 You could draw from that that customers like it and they want to see banks lending more
24:00 responsibly, thinking about the implications, for example, of funding more North Sea oil
24:07 exploration versus funding wind farms.
24:09 It's the kind of stuff that all companies are thinking about.
24:14 The banking sector has been thinking about especially.
24:17 But it's extremely interesting times and it is fascinating, though very uneasy for the
24:22 people in the middle of it, to watch the great agents of capitalism, the banking sector,
24:29 being dragged into the culture war and being accused of being the liberal woke problem.
24:39 My thanks to Paul Kelso and Jason Farrell.
24:41 That's your lot from The Daily with me, Neil Paterson.
24:43 We'll see you next time.
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