https://www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk/c...une-newsletter

The big story: CSE report ‘protected senior police officers’, say whistleblowers

Top line: South Yorkshire Mayor Oliver Coppard has demanded to see a report produced by the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) into the actions of senior South Yorkshire Police officers during the Rotherham grooming gang scandal. His demand comes after a Channel 4 News report in which two former IOPC staff said the investigation was seriously flawed and they were discouraged from looking into the actions of senior officers.

Background: Ever since the Jay report concluded in 2014 that failures by South Yorkshire Police contributed to the sexual abuse of 1,400 girls in Rotherham between 1997 and 2013, efforts have been made to find out what went wrong. Set up a decade ago, Operation Linden cost Ł6 million and reported in 2022. After Hillsborough, it was the second largest investigation that the IOPC or its predecessor the IPCC had ever carried out.

The IOPC carried out 91 investigations into police failings covering 265 separate allegations made by 51 complainants. 47 officers were investigated, with the IOPC concluding eight had a case to answer for misconduct and six for gross misconduct.

However, no officers lost their job as a result of the investigation and the most severe sanction was a written warning. In 2022, Mr Coppard’s predecessor as Police and Crime Commissioner Dr Alan Billings said that in failing to “identify any individual accountability”, the report had “let down victims and survivors”.

Latest allegations: Last week, two whistleblowers involved in Operation Linden spoke to Channel 4 News. They allege that IOPC investigators were specifically told not to probe senior officers’ involvement in the failings and that the inquiry “barely scratched the surface”.

Operation Amazon: Another strand of Operation Linden looked specifically into allegations made by Rotherham CSE campaigner Jayne Senior and former South Yorkshire Police staff member Dr Angie Heal that senior SYP officers had failed in their statutory duties to protect vulnerable children. That investigation, Operation Amazon, upheld their complaint, but the report has never been made public, and Senior and Heal believe it has been deliberately “buried”. It is this report that Oliver Coppard is demanding to be given sight of. Speaking to Channel 4 News on Saturday, Mr Coppard said:

“What I ultimately want is to see the report so I can decide for myself whether that investigation was done properly and effectively and that people in South Yorkshire can have confidence in that work. I have asked them for it and my predecessor asked them for it. They said no to him but I’m hoping they have had a change of heart.”

When Channel 4 News’ Alex Thompson suggested that as the person with responsibility for overseeing the police in South Yorkshire, he should be able to demand to be able to see the report, Mr Coppard replied: “Well, you would think so, wouldn’t you?”

IOPC response: In their response to Channel 4 News, the IOPC strongly refuted the allegations. They said there had been a dedicated investigation team within Operation Linden which was focused solely on senior police officers, and that had they found any indication of corruption, it would have been “rigorously pursued”.