David Carrick admitted 49 offences, including 24 counts of rape, after carrying out sex attacks on a dozen women over an 18-year period. The 48-year-old pleaded guilty to four counts of rape, false imprisonment and indecent assault. Carrick joined the Met in 2001 after serving in the Army, despite allegations of malicious communications and burglary against an ex-partner the previous year.
Prosecutors told the court Carrick would appear “fun-loving, charming and charismatic” but was “very manipulative” and “very self-confident almost to the point of being cocky”.
Carrick admitted raping nine of the women, some on multiple occasions over months or years, with many of those attacks involving violence that would have left them physically injured.
Some were locked in a small cupboard under the stairs in his Hertfordshire home for hours without food or forced to clean his house naked.
Investigators said they discovered a pattern of behavior where he used his position as a police officer to gain the trust of his victims, who feared they would not be believed because of his position.
But Carrick faced no criminal sanctions or misconduct findings and was only suspended from the force after being arrested in October 2021.
Following the hearing Met Police Assistant Commissioner Barbara Gray said policing “has definitely taken a step back”.
She said it is “devastating” for the victims and for the “trust and confidence” the force is trying to earn.
The catalog of allegations made against Carrick both before and during his time at the police have sparked fury.
In 2002, Carrick was accused of harassment and assault against a former partner while still in his probationary period and was the subject of five complaints from members of the public between 2002 and 2008.
In 2009 he passed checks to become a firearms officer despite at least one further domestic incident.
The PC was given “words of advice” after being accused of grabbing a woman by the neck during a domestic incident investigated by Hertfordshire Constabulary in 2019.
Carrick met some of the women through online dating sites such as Tinder and Badoo or on social occasions, using his position as a police officer to gain their trust.
“Whilst he was not a man that stalked the streets scouting for victims – he invested time in developing relationships with women to sustain his appetite for degradation and control – the coercive nature of his offending undermined his victims in the most destructive way,” said Mr Moor.
Carrick admitted raping nine of the women, some on multiple occasions over months or years, with many of those attacks involving violence that would have left them physically injured.
Some were locked in a small cupboard under the stairs in his Hertfordshire home for hours without food or forced to clean his house naked.
Carrick whipped one woman with a belt, urinated on some of his victims, and told them when they could eat and sleep.
He called women “fat and lazy” or his “slave” as he controlled them financially, isolated them from friends and family, and forbade them from speaking with other men or even their own children.
“He thrived on humiliating his victims and cleverly used his professional position to intimate there was no point in them trying to seek help because they would never be believed,” said Detective Chief Inspector Iain Moor. “The coercive nature of his offending undermined his victims in the most destructive way.”
Detective Chief Inspector Iain Moor, from Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire Major Crime Unit, said the “sheer number of offences” showed Carrick’s “prolific and callous nature” and he expects even more victims to come forward.
“Whilst he was not a man that stalked the streets scouting for victims – he invested time in developing relationships with women to sustain his appetite for degradation and control – the coercive nature of his offending undermined his victims in the most destructive way,” said Mr Moor.
Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper said of the Carrick case: “This is a truly shocking and appalling case – with the most devastating rapes, sexual and violent crimes committed against women by a serving police officer. It is a tribute to the bravery of his victims that this man has now been caught.
“But it is further evidence of appalling failures in the police vetting and misconduct processes, still not addressed by Government, that he was ever able to serve as a police officer.
“Everyone who demanded change will feel badly let down today.”
Carrick is due to be sentenced on February 6.
