Police contact with a woman before she is seriously injured - Greater Manchester Police, September 2016

We conducted an independent investigation into Greater Manchester Police’s (GMP) contact with a woman before her ex-husband assaulted her in September 2016. She sustained serious injuries. Following the breakdown of the couple’s relationship in May 2016, GMP had recorded nine domestic related incidents.

This matter came to our attention in September 2016 as a death or serious injury referral. In February 2017 this investigation became a complaint investigation after the woman complained about her contact with GMP prior to the assault.

Our investigators scrutinised a range of GMP records and interviewed witnesses. We considered that two police officers and a police sergeant were ‘subjects’ of our investigation, at the level of misconduct.

The investigation concluded there was insufficient evidence upon which a reasonable tribunal, properly directed, could find misconduct in respect of the police sergeant. The investigation concluded that the conduct of the two police officers fell below the standard expected and may have amounted to poor performance. We recommended that the two officers should read our investigation report and have constructive discussions with their line managers around the areas of learning highlighted in it. We completed our investigation in November 2017.

Since this incident, GMP has introduced training for officers to identify risk for cases of domestic abuse, and set up a Vulnerability Support Unit.