30th September, 2021
A British police officer Wayne Couzens was on Thursday sentenced to whole life imprisonment for the murder of Sarah Everard.
Couzens abducted the 33 year-old woman as she was walking home, raped and then killed her.
The case shocked the country and sparked protests over male violence towards women.
Wayne Couzens, 48, a serving London officer who guarded diplomatic premises pleaded guilty to murder, rape and kidnap.
According to the terms of his life sentence at London’s Old Bailey court, he has no chance of parole.
Couzens abducted Everard, 33, into a hire car as she walked home from a friend’s house in south London on March 3 and her body was later found in woodland around 50 miles (80 km) away in southeast England.
A post-mortem concluded she had died as a result of compression of the neck.
Prosecutors said that Couzens and Everard were “total strangers”, and the murder prompted outpourings of anger from women who have recounted their own experiences and fears of being out alone at night.
Couzens was sentenced after a two-day hearing.
One witness saw Everard being handcuffed before her abduction, and police investigating the case said he may have used COVID-19 protocols as an excuse to falsely arrest her before killing her.
The Metropolitan Police Force, which both investigated the murder and for whom Couzens worked, said it was “sickened, angered and devastated” by his crimes, and Commissioner Cressida Dick has apologised to Everard’s family.
Britain’s police watchdog is looking into police failures to investigate an indecent exposure incident linked to Couzens in 2015, and two further such allegations in February this year.