Police boss admits they failed to connect Grindr serial killer Stephen Port’s murders
The Met Police boss has admitted there were mistakes over the case of Grindr serial killer Stephen Port.
The outgoing top cop, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, has admitted police failed to spot the four murders were connected.
Stephen Port, 41, was locked up for life last month after killing his victims over a 15 month period.
He was found guilty of drugging, raping and murdering his victims.
Despite three bodies being found in the same churchyard – two by the same woman walking her dog – the Metropolitan Police failed to join the dots between the cases.
Sir Hogan-Howe said: “We should have spotted earlier there was something wrong there.
“No-one put the connection together at the time.
“It just wasn’t realised there was a connection between the events and each of the events didn’t have an obvious suspicious element.”
He added, in the interview with LBC, that: “In retrospect, it looks obvious but at the time each officer had to deal with the circumstances they found.”
17 officers are now being investigated by the Independent Police Complaints Commission for the failures.
Seven officers from the Met Police have been served with gross misconduct notices telling them their conduct is under investigation.
Another ten officers have been served with misconduct notices.
Campaigner Peter Tatchell said: “If four young middle class women had been murdered in Mayfair, I believe the police would have made a public appeal much sooner and mounted a far more comprehensive investigation.
“The killing of low income gay men in working class Barking was treated very differently.”
41-year-old Stephen Port, of Barking, east London, was found guilty of four murders.
He was found guilty of the murders of Anthony Walgate, Gabriel Kovari, Daniel Whitworth, and Jack Taylor.
Handing down the sentenced, Mr Justice Openshaw said Port had told “the most elaborate lie” in relation to the death of Kovari in the witness box.
He said Port will die in prison as the court applauded when his sentenced was handed down. Shouts of “scumbag” and “yes” were heard from the court.
The judge also said he told “wicked and monstrous lies” when he placed a fake suicide note on the body of Whitworth.
