Undercover Policing Inquiry

On 20-22 February 2023, after seven years of evidence gathering and preliminary hearings, the Undercover Policing Inquiry (UCPI) heard Closing Submissions concerning the conduct of the Metropolitan Police's Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) between 1968-1982. In her closing on behalf of 25 women who were deceived into sexual relationships by undercover police officers and a child of one of those relationships, Charlotte Kilroy KC said that there were two central reasons why the women were abused by undercover police officers; contempt within the police force for women and disregard for the law. She highlighted a 1983 report commissioned by the Metropolitan Police which concluded that the police force was dominated by a ‘cult of masculinity’ in which extreme denigration and sexualisation of women was pervasive amongst police officers.

Reporting of the Closing Statements by the: BBC and the Guardian.

Links to the oral closing are at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q10xRpYb-do.

The written closing is at: https://www.ucpi.org.uk/publications/closing-statement-t1-cat-h-cps/

An interim report from the Chair of the UCPI, Sir John Mitting will follow.

Charlotte Kilroy KC and Tom Lowenthal act for the Category H Core Participants.