A self-described ‘Bad Cop’ who had a sexual relationship with a domestic violence victim has been convicted of misconduct in public officer (MIPO) for computer misuse. Ex-PC Daniel Humphreys, 38, shared sensitive information from the Met’s computer systems with a woman whose ex-boyfriend he was investigating for an alleged assault, Southwark Crown Court heard this month.
Humphreys was cleared of a second MIPO charge relating to pursuing an inappropriate relationship with a woman who was in a vulnerable position. During the trial, jurors were told Humphreys and the woman’s sexual relationship was not in dispute, but they should decide whether it was criminal. Humphreys will be sentenced at Southwark Crown Court on October 3.
PC Humphreys met the woman while investigating an alleged attack by her ex, staying behind to take her statement while a colleague conveyed the suspect to custody. After they developed a sexual relationship, Humphreys shared crime reports, body-worn footage, and the details of victims, apparently to help her with her ambition of becoming a Special Constable with the force.
IOPC director Amanda Rowe said: “Police officers should be aware that any misuse of computer systems for non-policing reasons is potentially an extremely serious offence. It is a form of corruption and reduces the public’s confidence in the police service. Former PC Humphreys now has a criminal record and will be sentenced in October.”
The IOPC say PC Humphreys had a case to answer in relation to gross misconduct for abuse of power for sexual purpose (APSP) and sharing information from Met Police computer systems without authorisation and for a non-policing purpose. PC Humphreys resigned from the force in May 2023, the day before he was due to face an accelerated misconduct hearing organised by the Met.
Gross misconduct was found proven at the hearing and Humphreys would have been sacked had he not already quit. He was also barred from a return to policing. The IOPC investigation examined shared WhatsApp messages, interviewed the officer under criminal caution and took a statement from the woman.
‘Obvious power imbalance’
Opening the case, prosecutor Lyndon Harris told jurors the case was about Humphreys ‘abusing his position as a police constable’ to form a sexual relationship with the woman, potentially undermining a court case.
“Not only is there an obvious power imbalance, but there is also the obvious risk of prejudicing a live criminal investigation,” said Mr Harris.
“A victim of domestic abuse is inherently vulnerable. [She] was in a vulnerable position and she was entitled to rely on the officers attending to seek to be professional, observing appropriate boundaries, to support her but not allow a personal relationship to develop.
“The prosecution asks rhetorically: Is there a better example of a power imbalance than a police officer and a victim of domestic abuse?”
‘He did not think he was doing anything wrong’
In the 12 hours after Humphreys left the woman’s home, they exchanged 74 messages, described by the prosecution as ‘mildly flirty’ and including Humphreys’ admission it would be ‘frowned upon’ by police colleagues.
As their ‘flirty’ friendship developed, Humphreys brought the woman to police social functions and invited her into the police car while on-duty, but concealed how they had met, jurors were told. Things became sexual nearly a year after they met, the woman claimed in her IOPC interview.
The woman told investigators they sex all around the house, including ‘lots of oral sex’, and she could not understand how Humphreys had time to work. Things only cooled off when the woman away to visit family in Poland.
Humphreys refused to leave his partner, so the woman gave him an ultimatum, threatening to reveal their affair. But Humphreys’ partner already suspected he was having an affair and both of Humphreys’ relationships broke down anyway.
Humphreys ‘accepted the bare facts’ in his interview, but claimed ‘No one else would really understand the relationship’ and ‘he did not think he was doing anything wrong’. He also blamed relationship difficulties, low self-esteem, and mental health, jurors were told.
With the relationship accepted, Mr Harris told jurors: “What is likely to be an issue for you is that this misconduct is so serious that it crosses the threshold from police disciplinary matter to criminal offence.”
‘Enjoy the sweets, Bad Cop’
Recalling the night of the 999 call, the woman told IOPC investigators she bonded with Humphreys after he noticed the instruments around her house. Just three minutes after he left, she got a call from an unknown number, which she told the investigator was Humphreys on his personal phone claiming he had forgotten to take her boyfriend’s gold ring from the table as evidence.
The woman told Humphreys her partner had taken an intimate video of her and feared he would use it against her. But Humphreys joked ‘it’s probably on PornHub already’, she told the IOPC “He was laughing about it, but it was not funny,” she claimed.
Another time, Humphreys sent her a photo of him with a female colleague and said he had ‘done this once before’, explaining the colleague had been the victim of an assault before he helped her become a police officer, the woman claimed.
The woman claimed she would bring juice and milkshakes to Humphreys in his police car near her house, and that he would also come to her house for cups of tea while he worked on his tablet.
But she started to worry about neighbours seeing a police car outside her home too often, and had concerns about Humphreys ‘turning up uninvited’ due to alleged stalking in her previous relationship, she said. On one occasion, Humphreys left her a bag of sweets outside her house in the middle of the night, with a note signed ‘Good morning, Enjoy the sweets, Bad Cop’, she claimed.
The Covid lockdowns were a ‘lonely time’ for her, and this is when the friendship began to develop ‘feelings’, she recalled. On one occasion, Humphreys drove her to the top of Primrose Hill to ‘enjoy the view’ while he was dealing with an evidence bag full of wine from a shoplifting call in Swiss Cottage, the court heard. “I think [the public] thought I was an undercover police officer,” she said.
Remarking on Humphreys’ attitude, she said: “In all those years I have known him, he never said it was a wrongdoing or he could get in trouble for that. He was kind of doing that stuff like he was doing it for a long time, like it was okay. No one was really checking on what he was doing. If anyone checked, he just said he was having food. When he was on his own he was usually at mine and seeing me and nobody was checking on that. All his colleagues as well. I did not know anything was wrong as no one said anything.”
‘Do you actually go to your job?’
When the sexual element of the relationship began, the woman said: “Almost every time we saw each other we had sex. It was very funny. Was in different places… We were having lots of oral sex. If no intercourse, we would have some sort of sexual contact. I was laughing: ‘Do you actually go to your job because you are coming every day now?’
But, the woman claimed, Humphreys started to get jealous and things got ‘really weird’ once they began having sex. After meeting her ex-boyfriend, he appeared insecure and would tell her ‘I’m not a man’, she said. “It started being more intense and that’s when the dark side and second person started coming out. All the ugly stuff started,” she claimed.
The woman alleged Humphreys would check on her ‘constantly’, making her feel uncomfortable by turning up uninvited and calling her while she was at work. On one occasion she claimed he sent a photo of himself ‘looking for her’ at her workplace. “He done this three times. He kind of justified like this is okay, he did not know, brushing it under the carpet,” she added.
Humphreys concealed his face with a black mask, dark sunglasses, baseball cap, and large red umbrella as he left Southwark Crown Court after the first day of his trial.
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